FC Barcelona vice-president Josep Maria Bartomeu admits they were forced to go higher for Neymar as other clubs made contact with Santos. Barca will pay €57 million for the Brazilian star, which will be distributed among three companies (DISC, TEISA, N&N) and Santos. The companies have asked Barcelona to keep the percentages of the transfer sum allocated to each entity confidential.

The price went up "due to the interference from other clubs," declared Bartomeu.

He added: "Neymar wanted to come to Barça and that helped us a lot seeing that the amount of money we were willing to offer, 40 million euros, only increased to 57 million euros."

Another reason Neymar's price went up was "because we had hoped to bring him in 2014, and there's an extra cost for bringing him earlier."

Bartomeu revealed that Barça had first contacted Santos FC and the player in 2011 and that's why last year's budget reflected a €10 million downpayment on the player's services. FC Barcelona expects to pay the full sum for Neymar over the next three years.