A year later, and despite the efforts made in the summer with the arrival of big names such as Lewandowski, Kounde or Raphinha, the technicians asked for an extra effort to start preparing Busquets’ replacement, a historical necessity that for Xavi it is even more urgent than fixing the lack that Barça has at right back. But this time there is not even the intention to operate in the market that has been open since January 1st. The salary cap is once again exceeded and, given the lack of options to wipe it mid-season, those responsible for the sports plot have decided to postpone any move until later. There is no room to try to sign Zubimendi, so desired by the coach, nor to register the new contracts of Gavi and Araujo, who in the eyes of the League retain the conditions prior to the substantial improvements they have experienced. In fact, in an interview with What are you playing with? of the SER, the Culer executive president, Joan Laporta, calculated the gap between income and sports salaries at 26 million euros. Not even with the surprising withdrawal of Piqué have come out some numbers also affected by the premature elimination in the Champions League.
But the Camp Nou and Sant Joan Despí offices are not expecting miracles at the end of the season and for the next one either. “Right now, the forecast is that we won’t have fair play this summer,” sources from the Barça sports area predict to ARA, who are pessimistic about the possibility of making many improvements to the team by the end of the course. That’s why negotiations will begin soon to extend Sergi’s contract Roberto and the probable extension of the captain, Busquets, beyond June 30. There are four reasons that, at the moment, prevent us from thinking big in terms of additions.
- Leverage limitation. If Barça was able to strengthen itself so much last summer, it was due to the impact of two equity sales (television rights and half of Barça Studios) which served to reverse the negative equity with 800 million euros and especially to raise the salary cap. Laporta and Alemany planned to apply the same recipe with Barça Licensing and Merchandising, valued at more than 300 million, but the League, which already accepted the levers of Sixth Street and Barça Studios with tweezers, has acted accordingly and approved very important changes in the economic control regulations that limit Barça with the hypothetical sale of BLM. The organization has free rein to sign it, but it already knows that it will only be able to devote 5% of what it reports to sports spending. This impediment blows up the forecasts.
- None of the marketable players want to leave. With no levers in sight, the classic way to get salary margin is by releasing tokens and collecting capital gains with transfers. Barça has well-rated players who would help in this regard, but from the sports area they detect that none of those who would represent an interesting pinch are ready to leave the Barça ship. For example, Kessie, who arrived at zero cost and would leave a net surplus if he exits, has said he won’t move even if he has a few minutes. The same goes for Memphis Depay, who is determined to stay and collect his contract in full until June 30, and footballers for whom offers would be heard, such as Ferran Torres, Ansu Fati, Dembélé or Raphinha. None of these four young and marketable strikers would agree to leave Barça at this time. Even more, right now the most feasible way to collect a transfer is Lenglet, who is on loan at Tottenham and is playing a good role.
- Homework to do before signing. The market is capricious and Barça, before considering signings at zero cost like that of Iñigo Martínez, who would sign on a free transfer to cover the hole of Piqué, or of Rúben Neves, bet on Laporta and Mendes to strengthen the core ·lar, he has two priorities to solve no matter how little salary limit he achieves. The most urgent is to register Araujo’s new contract: the old one ends on June 30 and there is no more room to postpone the renewal of paperwork in the League records. There is also the commitment to update the conditions of Gavi, who will have to play until the end of the season with the subsidiary’s file in the face of the impossibility of signing his new contract. Once this matter is fixed, the sports area should make room for the renewals of players who renew year after year, such as Sergi Roberto, Marcos Alonso and Héctor Bellerín. Of these three, only the last generates doubts in the technicians, who would prefer to bet on the young Arnau Martínez, from Girona. With Busquets, if he continued beyond this summer, he should also be obtained fair play even if it renewed for a few months at the bottom.
- Resignation with legacy contracts. With no clear leverage or sales in sight, another avenue to oxygenate the salary cap is to renegotiate existing contracts downward, which has been attempted in many ways and was only achieved in the summer of 2021, after the traumatic exit of Messi, with Piqué, Busquets and Jordi Alba. A few months ago another gesture was requested from the captains and also from De Jong and Ter Stegen, but in the face of the impossibility of reaching an agreement, the club has changed its strategy and assumes that it cannot touch the pockets of the beneficiaries of contracts inherited from the previous board. Piqué’s is already settled, Busquets’ ends in six months and Alba’s in 2024.
To this panorama of forced containment, the Montjuïc factor must be added, which will cause a drop in ordinary income that will exceed 100 million next season. A hole that Laporta, as he told the SER, would like to compensate by setting up activities at the Anella Olímpica on match days. The culer leader also dropped another way to make money: selling promising young people from La Masia.
