Gerard Pique stokes Cesc Fabregas talk by dreaming of 2011 alongside Arsenal star at Barcelona

By Sportsmail Reporter
Updated: 11:23 EDT, 31 December 2010

Tender moment: Pique and Fabregas embrace at the Emirates last season

Mischievous Gerard Pique has made a New Year wish to play alongside Cesc Fabregas at Barcelona.

Pique was one of the key characters in Barca unsettling the Arsenal captain last summer and is starting 2011 in the same vein.

As the transfer window prepares to creek open, familiar headlines in Spain insist the champions of La Liga will reopen their annual battle to re-sign a player they lost to the Gunners as a 16-year-old.

Pique wants to dump Arsenal out of the Champions League and dreams of playing at Wembley in the final - and then hopes Fabregas will join him in Catalonia next summer.

‘Playing in this Barcelona team is a joy, because of the football we play and the good people who wear the shirt,’ Pique told the El Mundo Deportivo newspaper.

‘It would be nice to see my friend Cesc playing at the Camp Nou.’

The comments will not surprise Arsenal, but could be counter-productive.

The Emirates Stadium hierarchy were furious with the way Barca conducted a PR campaign to sign Fabregas during the summer, which only made them more determined to hold on to the midfielder.

Top gun: Fabregas battles with Chelsea midfielder Mikel (left)

Spain man: Pique at the World Cup

Arsene Wenger won the power struggle then, with a £29million bid almost laughed off, and insisted he would do everything possible to resist further bids.

Jose Mourinho is also said to be keen, with reports from the Spanish capital saying Real Madrid will make a £35m bid in the summer.

However, Barca are relaxed about interest from their rivals and see it as just an attempt to disrupt plans to take the 23-year-old to Catalonia.

Fabregas has made no secret of his emotional ties to the blaugrana- and he idolises coach Pep Guardiola - though his previous statements on whether he could one day play for Real have been ambiguous.

Pique trod a similar path to his friend, leaving Barca as a teenager for Manchester United only to return in 2008. The difference is that he struggled for opportunities at Old Trafford, while Fabregas has blossomed and credits Wenger for shaping his career.

Pique said in July that Fabregas had made his feelings clear to Spain team-mates at the World Cup and insisted his ‘heart is in Barcelona’.