Atletico Madrid responded to Barcelona’s reported pursuit of Julian Alvarez with public, tongue-in-cheek transfer proposals. Barcelona were said to have opened talks and reached an agreement for the Argentine forward, with a 90m euro offer expected. Atletico indicated they would likely reject the bid and posted satirical messages on social media. The posts offered Barcelona players in exchange for items such as Bad Bunny concert tickets, an annual subscription to ABC, and sunflower seeds. Additional offers included more concert tickets for Pedri and a loan-for-loan swap involving Raphinha, referencing a prior naming mistake by Atletico’s president. The posts used AI-generated images, spread rapidly, and included a final note about the speed of creating fake content.
"Atletico Madrid aimed a tongue-in-cheek dig at La Liga rivals Barcelona over their "smear campaign" in pursuit of Julian Alvarez. According to BBC Sport columnist Guillem Balague, Barca have opened talks to sign the Argentine forward, with an agreement in place for the 26-year-old. But, as reported on Thursday, Atletico are likely to turn down the 90m euros (77.9m) Barca are expected to offer - and so the Madrid club's barrage of social media posts on Friday evening proved."
"First, they laid out their proposal for 18-year-old Spain star Yamal. "We have sent a fax to FC Barcelona with our transfer offer: 4 tickets for tomorrow's Bad Bunny concert, an annual subscription to ABC, and a bag of sunflower seeds. We eagerly await the response to prepare the 'announce'," they wrote. More 'approaches' were made for other players too - all featuring AI-generated images of them in an Atleti shirt."
"For Spain midfielder Pedri, the concert offering was increased to six tickets for Sunday's gig at the club's Riyadh Air Metropolitano Stadium, before bidding "loan for a season and in exchange we loan out Tom Ford and Smith with no option to buy" for Brazil winger Raphinha. By 'Tom Ford and Smith', the club were referring to a gaffe made by Atleti president Enrique Cerezo earlier in the year when he named both as players for his side. "An offer impossible to refuse," they wrote."
"The flurry of posts came in just over an hour and quickly went viral, going into more than 55 million X account feeds. The popularity was undoubtedly driven by the surprise - it is highly unusual for a club to make such satirical comments about a rival on a public forum. Atleti finished their remarks with two further, more serious, points. "Remember, it took us just five minutes to create this fake post. We live in an era where reality"
Read at www.bbc.com
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