Barcelona Preps Contract Upgrade for Marc Bernal Amid Rodri Talks

Barcelona doesn't want any surprises with its homegrown talent, especially not with one it considers untouchable. That's why the Catalan club has a meeting scheduled in the coming days with Marc Bernal to discuss a contract upgrade, right at a moment when negotiations for Rodri keep moving forward and could reshape the distribution of minutes in midfield.

Bernal signed his renewal in September 2025, a deal running through June 30, 2030 with a release clause of 500 million euros. At the time it looked like solid protection, but the club promised him it would revisit those terms down the line. That review is exactly what's now on the table.

Why now? Because with genuine interest in Rodri, any academy product might start wondering where he stands in the team. And according to sources close to the club, Deco wants to walk into that meeting with a clear message: Bernal isn't a backup piece, he's part of the project, whether or not the World Cup winner arrives from Manchester City.

The midfielder himself, just 19 years old, is also eager to improve his terms at the club where he grew up. He isn't a player who arrived from elsewhere to make a name for himself: he's homegrown, having come up through every youth category before breaking into the first team, and both Deco and Joan Laporta view him as one of the great future pillars of Barcelona's midfield.

That internal appreciation makes sense given what he already showed last season. Bernal logged 1,313 minutes split between LaLiga (787'), the Champions League (282'), the Copa del Rey (218') and the Spanish Super Cup (26'), and also chipped in five goals: two in the league, two in the cup and one in Europe's top competition. Not bad numbers at all for someone so young, and they explain why several clubs in the Premier League, Germany and Italy are keeping close tabs on his situation.

A Midfield Being Reshuffled

Barcelona already has a deep squad in central midfield, and signing Rodri, if it goes through, would make it even more crowded. Sources at the club describe "optimism" about that deal, though they admit it isn't simple, even with an agreement already reached with the Madrid-born player.

Adding to that is another factor weighing on Hansi Flick's planning: Frenkie de Jong remains sidelined with a knee injury suffered at the World Cup, an issue he reportedly doesn't want to have surgically repaired, which could keep him out for more than six months. With Fermín López already back from his foot injury, the pool of available midfielders for Flick would be Bernal, Gavi, Fermín, Pedri and Dani Olmo, pending confirmation of Rodri's arrival. Marc Casadó, on the other hand, isn't part of the German coach's plans.