Barcelona finalise second January signing – announcement pending

For weeks, Barcelona have been working on bringing in a new striker, and a deal has now been completed in the last 24 hours. Hamza Abdelkarim is the player that has been worked on, and after weeks of negotiations, the process appears to be finalised.

Barcelona made their initial move for Abdelkarim in December, and after their opening offer was turned down, they returned to the bidding later in the month. A deal with Al Ahly was struck, but it had been on hold for a couple of weeks due to deadlocked talks between the 18-year-old and his current club.

However, everything has now been sorted out, with Abdelkarim now set to secure his move to Barcelona. As per MD, the final details were completed on Thursday, with only an announcement now pending.

Abdelkarim joins on loan with option to buy

Abdelkarim, who will join up with the Barca Atletic squad upon arrival, will arrive on an initial loan deal, but the Catalan club will have the option to secure his services on a permanent basis for a fee of €3m, which could rise to €5m depending on certain variables being achieved.

There are high hopes within Can Barca for Abdelkarim, who is seen as being someone that can make the step to the Barcelona first team in the coming years – provided that he is signed permanently in the summer. He is poised for an immediate starting role with Barca Atletic due to injury woes in the striker position, so he will have the chance to make his mark early on.

It remains to be seen how Abdelkarim gets on during the remainder of the season. Playing in the fourth tier of Spanish football will allow him to make a strong start to life at Barcelona, but for him, the hard work starts now.

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