31.07.2010 17:10
28 players to make trip to Asia
www.fcbarcelona.cat
Guardiola will take 28 players on the Asia Tour. Messi and Alves join the other 9 members of the first team squad with 17 players from Barca B, whilst Jeffren and Bojan, who have been called into the Spanish under 21squad, miss the trip.
After Thursday’s opening game in Oslo, Barca fly out for the first stage of their Asia Tour,
which takes in games in South Korea and China and Guardiola has announced the 28 players who will
make up the party.
Messi and Alves
Leo Messi and Dani Alves, who returned from their holidays on Saturday, are both
included in the squad alongside first team colleagues Pinto, Milito, Maxwell, Víctor Sánchez,
Adriano, Ibrahimovic, Keita, Abidal and Hleb.
Barca B presence
With the Spanish World Cup winners still unavailable, Guardiola has taken advantage of the
Tour to cast an eye over a number of B team youngsters: Miño, Oier, Ilie, Sergi Gómez, Martí
Riverola, Jonathan dos Santos, Jonathan Soriano, Armando, Dalmau, Benja, Edu Oriol, Muniesa,
Nolito, Sergi Roberto, and Tello all travel, as do Víctor Vázquez, Fontàs, who are still recovering
from injury, but have begun training.
Bojan and Jeffren to stay at home
Bojan and Jeffren have both been called up for Spain’s under-21 European
Championship qualifier against Finland on August 11th. The Spanish squad will meet up on August 5th
and the Barca staff decided the two would be better served by staying on in Barcelona to train,
rather than having to make a break in the Tour, which would mean three long trips – to Korea
and back and then to Finland, in a short period of time.
Full list
The full list of players who will travel to Asia is: Pinto, Miño, Oier, Ilie, Sergi Gómez, Milito,
Maxwell, Riverola, Jonathan dos Santos, Víctor Sánchez, Jonathan Soriano, Adriano, Armando, Dalmau,
Benja, Ibrahimovic, Edu Oriol, Keita, Muniesa, Nolito, Sergi Roberto, Víctor Vázquez, Fontàs,
Abidal, Alves, Messi, Hleb and Tello.