Barcelona “announced” a pretty big signing in the early hours of Wednesday morning.
The Catalan club posted an update to their millions of followers on social media, declaring that they had completed the signing of Angel di Maria from Paris Saint-Germain. Di Maria has been linked with a move away from the Qatari-owned club, as they seek to trim their wage bill following the world record transfer deal for Neymar.
Barcelona are one of the clubs linked with a move for the former Manchester United winger, however, the announcement of his signing on Twitter and Facebook caught people by surprise.
It soon turned out that Barca’s official Twitter and Facebook accounts had been hacked, and Di Maria was not on his way from Paris to the Nou Camp. Hackers calling themselves “OurMine” claimed responsibility for the hoax and posted another two tweets, which have since been deleted.
Manchester United striker Romelu Lukaku’s Instagram account has also been hacked in the last 24 hours, but there’s no suggestion that the same group responsible for the Barcelona hack were behind it.
Barcelona fans have been crying out for their team to make some signings after the departure of Neymar to PSG and losing to Real Madrid in the Super Cup. The squad looks lightweight, Luis Suarez is out injured for a few weeks and the burden on Lionel Messi has become even greater. Di Maria would have been a good signing if he had performed in a manner similar to his Real Madrid days. But, if he had played as he did for Manchester United, fans will be glad that it was just a hoax announcing his arrival at the Nou Camp.
The club regained control of their social media accounts and posted an apology, issued just after a tweet about Paulinho, their new signing who had an unhappy in the Premier League with Spurs.
Reports that signing Paulinho is another hoax are unconfirmed.
Its Neymar😄😄😄 pic.twitter.com/w1Jo51V7xq
— Melbi_C (@Melbi_C) August 23, 2017
https://twitter.com/AmeyaMoholkar/status/900211228752138240
https://twitter.com/sanjaycr7patil/status/900226785912160256
https://twitter.com/SkywalkerRM/status/900207074168197124
