La Liga has banned Barcelona from signing more players in the transfer market after confirming a diminishing financial fortunes of the club.
The club has reportedly been informed by La Liga of the transfer ban and have been given a condition for it to be lifted.
Following the 2019 covid pandemic, Barcelona slipped into financial crisis and had to allow one of their legendary and home-grown stars Lionel Messi leave the club due to the mounting financial crisis.
Despite Lionel Messi’s exit, La Liga Chief Executive Javier Tebas left no stone unturned in mounting heavy pressure on the La Liga giant to cut their spending and reduce their activities in the transfer market.
Barcelona were among the biggest spenders in the transfer market last summer, signing the likes of Robert Lewandowski, Jules Kounde, and Raphinha.
They came into loggerheads with La Liga in their bid to register their new signings for the 2022/23 football season due to their worsening financial situation.
The club had to trigger several financial levers at the dearth to stay afloat and avoid collision with La Liga Fair Play Rules. Some of the economic levers triggered include sale of the club’s TV rights, and plea with the players to accept wage cuts as they intend to offset their costly outlay.
Despite the big measures taken by the club to offset the dwindling financial fortunes, their debt profile was still estimated in the excess of €1bn.
The Catalans finally survived La Liga Fair Play Rules and registerwd all their new signings, but twere still under scrutiny.
Meanwhile, the club’s President Joan Laporte had maintained the Barcelona’s financial situation has improved after the run in with the La Liga, with plans to cut wage spending by £150m.
There were also projections Barcelona’s progress in the Champions League can help the club offset it’s mounting debt. Sadly, they were eliminated in the group stage and were bundled out of the Europa League by Manchester United in the playoffs.
Speaking with Financial Times, La Liga Chief, Javier Tebas has confirmed Barcelona has been banned from the transfer market due to the club’s mounting debt.
‘As of today, Barcelona doesn’t have any room in its budget to spend in the upcoming transfer window,’ LaLiga chief Javier Tebas said in London Business Summit on Thursday.
Javier Tebas also questioned Barcelona’s decision to sale the club’s TV rights in an attempt to offset the club’s debt. Tebas reiterated his unyielding stance that such “questionable behavior.” will not be allowed next time, insisting the option available for the club is to sell players and cut wages.
‘Barcelona has been involved in questionable behaviour which has had an impact on LaLiga and we are acting accordingly. We have ruled that they can no longer sign more players.
‘They sold off £620m (€700m) in TV rights and tried to find different ways to solve the situation but they won’t be able to do that next season. We have strict economic controls. At the end of each window, we tell all the clubs in LaLiga what they can spend.
‘In the case of Barcelona, they have to drop from spending on wages and transfers from £532m to £399m (€650m to €450m), so it’s a budget of minus £177m (€200m).
‘They have to reduce their investment in players and we have encouraged them to sell players because, for every amount they raise in sales, they can spend 40 per cent of that.’
Barcelona have a list of players that have caught the interest of big clubs in Europe with Manchester United reigniting interest in Frenkie De Jong after a dramatic transfer saga that ended with no deal.
Ansu Fati is also said to be on the radar of the Red Devils next summer, but no concrete interest has been recorded yet.
Barcelona have a list of players on loan at the club which they could do away with for a bleather in suffocating debt space.
As things stand, it is believed offloading some key players and reducing wage may not likely offset the club’s debt burden without permanently depleting the squad’s quality.
