BarcelonaThe difficult economic situation at the Camp Nou has marked Barça’s main lines in the craziest transfer market in years. President Joan Laporta and his executives have set themselves a clear goal since they landed at Can Barça: to reduce the payroll. To do so, they wanted to give out dispensable players with the highest chips and incorporate free or very low cost footballers. In some cases these goals have been met; in others, homework has been pending.
Lowering the salary of first-team players is necessary if the new board wants to clean up the accounts. Prior to Messi’s departure, the payroll was over 110% of Barça’s income, far from meeting the salary cap imposed by the League on clubs. The Argentine’s farewell meant lowering this percentage to 95%. The work, however, was far from over. When we planted ourselves in the last weeks of the market, we still had to find a way out of certain footballers and renegotiate with the captains a new pay cut. In this task, both departures and arrivals were transcendental. Eric Garcia and Kun Agüero arrived free from City while Memphis Depay landed in Barcelona from Olympique de Lyon. None of them meant an expense for Barça (meeting the objectives set), as did Luuk de Jong, signing on the horn at the close of the market.
The outings deserve a separate chapter. The most important and that has left more room for economic maneuver has been Leo Messi. Without the 71 million that the Argentine charged, the Barça leaders saw some light at the end of the tunnel, but it was still necessary to get rid of some other high profile. This has been the case of Antoine Griezmann, who, thanks to his return to Atlético de Madrid, has released 36 million euros from the Catalan fund. The departures of Francisco Trincão (8), Junior Firpo (6), Ilaix Moriba (2), Matheus Fernandes (0.6) and Emerson Royal (3) have left a balance of 126.6 million euros less in salary expenditure of the first team.
Box and freedom with the exits
In addition, with these outings the club has also made money. The most extraordinary case has been that of Emerson Royal. Barça paid 9 million euros to Betis in June for the services of the twenty-two-year-old defender, but the Catalan club, in the last hours of the season, accepted an offer from Tottenham. Considering that the Andalusian club retains 20% of the transfer and the cost of the signing, the Barça club has received 3.8 million euros. The big capital injection, however, was thanks to the transfer of Antoine Griezmann. Although it has been made in the form of a transfer (one more season as an optional one), the Frenchman will not be wearing the Barça shirt again, as the mattress team has a compulsory purchase option at the end of the contract. 40 million will land in the coffers of the Camp Nou when this purchase takes place, in a year or two. Barça have also sold Junior Firpo to Leeds United for 15 million euros, Carles Aleñá to Getafe (5), Sergio Akieme to Almeria (3.5) and Konrad de la Fuente to Olympique de Marseille (3).
However, at Can Barça they are not entirely happy. Players that Ronald Koeman has already made public that he does not have (such as Samuel Umtiti, Miralem Pjanic, Álex Collado and Riqui Puig) are still at the club, and some with unbearable salaries for the entity given the war economy established at Can Barça. Pjanic with 16.5 and Samuel Umtiti with 13.4 are two players from whom the club wanted to get rid of this market and who will still be wearing the Barça shirt. After this revolution, the highest paid footballer in the squad is Philippe Coutinho with 24.5 million a year.
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