No, silly newspaper, Bernardeschi isn't going to Barcelona

So normally we don't like to address spectacularly dumb rumors, but this one's too funny not to mention. Barca-centric daily Mundo Deportivo has run a front page spread in which some poor journalist who's hopelessly overmatched by the crushing truth of reality claims that Barcelona are keeping tabs on Federico Bernardeschi.

In this egregious case of "Uh, we're totally out of ideas and the Blaugrana need attacking depth, so we're just going to list talented young players" Mundo Deportivo pretends that Berna would go to Barca. Setting aside the outright Zamp-level crazy in that sentence, there's no reason for that. Federico just signed a contract extension to 2019 and has repeatedly pledged his love for the city and team. Just this month, he reiterated his desire to become Fiorentina's Francesco Totti, and he's never made a peep about leaving. And can we even live in a world in which best bros Berna and Khouma Babacar are separated?

Furthermore, going to Barca would be a terrible career move. Look at how many young attackers have flamed out there over the years: Bojan Krkic, Alexis Sanchez, Giovanni Dos Santos, and hordes of others. If you want to play for Barca, you're going to spend a lot of time on the bench, and that's the opposite of what young Federico wants. Dude needs to play lots of minutes, both to continue developing as a player and to break into the senior Azzuri, where a number of authorities are already calling for his inclusion to the Euro squad. Gathering dust on the bench, even one as illustrious as Barcelona's, would put paid to that immediately.

So yeah, now that we've all laugh-shamed Mundo Deportivo, let's move on with our lives and forget this ever happened, because it doesn't do to dwell on dumb stuff. So instead, let's watch Berna beat up on Barca, because that's fun and not hopelessly off-the-mark.