Barcelona have inserted ‘fear clause’ in loan agreement for veteran midfielder

This past Monday, FC Barcelona confirmed that Oriol Romeu had left the club to join Catalan rivals Girona on a season-long loan deal.

The veteran Spaniard had joined the Blaugrana from Girona last year on a permanent transfer worth €3.4 million.

However, despite making a solid start to life back at his boyhood club, Romeu fell out of prominence as the season progressed.

Rumours of a return to Girona had been doing the rounds since January and even though it briefly appeared like he might be given a fresh chance by new manager Hansi Flick, it was not to be.

Fear clause inserted

As mentioned earlier, Romeu rejoined Girona earlier this week, with the operation being a simple loan deal with no purchase option.

Now, SPORT has come forward with an update on the agreement between Barcelona and Girona, confirming the existence of a ‘fear clause’ in the deal.

It would entail that if Girona were to play Romeu against his parent club Barcelona when the two teams come face-to-face, the former would owe the Blaugrana a sum of money.

Barcelona had inserted a similar fear clause in their loan agreement with Girona for Pablo Torre last season and as per the report, a similar arrangement has been made in the Romeu deal.

Girona were stipulated to pay around €300,000 to Barcelona if they played Torre against them last season and a similar amount could be set for Romeu as well.

Interestingly, though, there was no fear clause in the deal for Eric Garcia, who also spent the last season on loan at Girona from Barcelona as it was a last-minute operation completed on deadline day in a hurry.

As such, it is unlikely that Romeu will face Barcelona when they take on Girona as the Montilivi outfit would have to shell out a sum if they used him in the Catalan derby.