Abidal shares anti-De Ligt post, Barcelona claim his account was hacked

FC Barcelona have said that Éric Abidal’s official Instagram account was hacked, after the Frenchman had seemingly shared a post that targeted Matthijs de Ligt.

The Ajax defender had recently told reporters he wasn’t sure whether he was joining Barcelona or not, and Abidal’s Instagram seemed to have a dismissive reply.

“He who doubts whether to play for Barça no longer helps us,” the image said, quoting former Barcelona manager Johan Cruyff.

“Thank you, Johan, you are right,” Abidal seemingly wrote.

Within an hour, the post was gone. Barcelona announced that the post was a result of a hack.

Social media slips are sometimes covered up by someone claiming they were hacked, but there’s a good reason to believe this was not a legitimate post.

The hashtags used in the post were seemingly random and had no connection to the image. Most had to do with bitcoin or cryptocurrency. Perhaps the hacker was trying to use the hack as a way to drive attention to his pet issue?