In a crazy turn of events, Fabrizio Romano says former West Ham technical director, Tim Steidten is set to join FC Barcelona. 

Barcelona’s sporting director Deco has been looking to bring in new people with professionalism and negotiation skills ahead of the summer transfer window, and the man that looks likely to be Tim Steidten.

According to Fabrizio Romano, the German has been in conversation with Deco about a role at the club and they have reportedly struck up a good relationship with the former Portugal midfielder.

Steidten left West Ham United in January just after Julen Lopetegui was sacked by the club after a bad summer transfer window and overall not a great time in East London. It remains to be seen if his good relationship with Deco would last as he fell out with both David Moyes and Julen Lopetegui at the club, even being banned from the training ground by both managers.

While Steidten did bring Mohammed Kudus to the club, pretty much every single other one of his signings hasn’t worked out or was an overpayment. Apart from maybe Aaron Wan-Bissaka, but it’s hard to credit Steidten for the most obvious West Ham signing ever.

Steidten was part of the Bayer Leverkusen staff that brought players like Jeremie Frimpong, Florian Wirtz and Moussa Diaby to the club. Barcelona fans will be hoping he makes more signings like that, not signings like Konstantinos Mavropanos and Niclas Fullkrug.

From his time at West Ham, what everyone said was his speciality was negotiating and getting deals over the line, rather than being the one to identify the best and brightest young players.

Barcelona must have scouts and knowledge everywhere, so if Steidten is only joining the club as a negotiator, rather than heading up the whole transfer operation, maybe it won’t be as much of a disaster as it was at West Ham