Barcelona took the unusual step on Monday of rescinding the contract of Sergi Guardiola, due to offensive, anti-Catalonia tweets posted on his account, just hours after signing the 24-year-old.
Guardiola signed in the afternoon for Barcelona B, but by the evening the club had moved to terminate the deal, despite the youngster's insistence that it wasn't him who posted the messages.
A joke from a friend
Speaking to Spanish radio station Cope, Guardiola claimed that he "didn’t write those tweets", and that it was a friend who "took [his] phone and did it". Guardiola described the incident as a "misunderstanding," maintaining that it was "a joke from a friend" and that he hadn't realised "the tweets even existed".
Despite this, the player swiftly made his apologies and accepted that he had "made a mistake", saying that he "understand[s] the decision" from Barcelona to cancel the move.
Among the tweets posted on Guardiola's account was "Hala Madrid", a common declaration of support for Barcelona's arch-rivals and fellow La Liga side Real Madrid.
Recent struggles
Guardiola has had a tough time of it over the past 12 months; after signing a contract on 4 May 2015, he agreed to a three-year deal with AD Alcorcón, which was made effective on 1 July. Despite that, he struggled to play for the club, and after playing just four games he terminated his contract on 24 December.
Four days later he signed a one-and-a-half year deal; a contract with reserve side Barcelona B in the third tier, but had his contract rescinded hours later due to tweets dating back from 2013.
Barcelona have a history of reacting strongly to this kind of behaviour, after choosing not to make an approach for the Betis midfielder Dani Ceballos due to comments made about the whistling of the national anthem during Barça's Copa del Rey final with Athletic Bilbao.