Saul Niguez has claimed that Atletico Madrid are forcing him to move to Barcelona, with Antoine Griezmann reportedly close to returning to Diego Simeone's side in the coming weeks in a shock swap deal with the midfielder.
Reports on Wednesday suggested that the 26-year-old Spaniard is in line for a switch to the Catalan giants, with Griezmann, 30, expected to return to Atletico in a player-plus-cash transfer.
The Frenchman, it is said, was open to a move back to Atleti as soon as it became clear that Barcelona wanted to sell him to free up their wage bill, with the 2018 FIFA World Cup winner being among the club's highest-paid players.
Although it has been claimed that Saul is also happy with the potential deal, new reports revealed a comment the midfielder made in a training session on Thursday.
According to El Desmarque, while signing autographs outside Atletico's training ground, Saul claimed: "They're kicking me out of here, man."
This perhaps suggests that the Spaniard feels helpless regarding his future, although it should be noted that the context to what he said is not yet known.
Saul joined Atletico as a youth player from Real Madrid's academy in 2008, and has since made an incredible 337 appearances for the club, but is seemingly no longer to be strongly relied upon by Simeone.
The player was left out of Luis Enrique's Spain squad for the 2020 UEFA European Championship, with the last of his 19 caps for his country dating back to 2019.
