2023-08-04 07:30:13
BarcelonaThere is barely a week left until the start of the League. The 20 First Division teams finalize their preparations for the competition. These are intense days in the offices, where negotiations to buy and sell footballers are the order of the day. Many additions have already been made, almost a hundred, and there will be more until the summer market closes at the end of August. But, with seven days left until the official games start, only a quarter of the signings have the go-ahead to play. The fault, in the vast majority of cases, is the fair play finance.
A club signing a footballer is not valid until the League has registered him. In other words, it has validated its participation. On the website of the body chaired by Javier Tebas, where the movements are updated every day, there are only 26 additions for this season, when, in reality, up to 92 signings have been made – including bought players, those on loan and those who have gone from the subsidiary to having a file with the first team–. The competition can accommodate up to 500 players, 25 per team, but right now there are only 364 registered.
One of the teams that knows this problem well is Barça. This summer it has been strengthened with Gündogan, Íñigo Martínez and Oriol Romeu, in addition to guaranteeing Vitor Roque, who will arrive in 2024. But none has been registered, yet. Nor do they have authorization to play Ronald Araujo, Iñaki Peña, Sergi Roberto and Marcos Alonso, footballers who renewed their contracts during the season but who, because of the fair play, have not yet been able to be registered. For all that, Barça only has 13 players registered (a goalkeeper, three defenders, five midfielders and four forwards). “Next week we will solve it”, assure the Blaugrana club.
Barça, awaiting Dembélé and Barça Studios
Barça, as it happens to other Primera Division clubs, is overmatched. In other words, he does not have salary space to be able to sign up players normally and he has to sell footballers to make room for new additions. It is governed by the 50% rule, which allows half of what is saved from the wage bill (salary and depreciation) to be allocated to signings. Or 60% if it’s a franchise player that represents more than 5% of the payroll. On the imminent horizon there are two operations that should allow to give oxygen to the Blaugrana team. On the one hand, the departure of Dembélé, which will be official in the next few hours. And on the other, the leverage of 65 million for the resale of Barça Studios to a German fund.
But both operations have catch. In the case of Dembélé, Paris Saint-Germain will pay 50 million but half should be for the footballer, as stipulated in the contract. Barça, however, considers that the player has not fulfilled the agreed conditions and wants to keep all the money. A situation that looks like ending up in court. In the meantime, the League will have to decide if it considers the transfer to be 25 or 50 million. A very transcendent fact, since 35% of the profits generated by a sale can also be used to register footballers. In the case of the economic lever, TV3 announced this week that the German fund had withdrawn its offer. An information that the club categorically denied, and assured that they are still working to close the operation, although they cannot guarantee which day the closure will be effective.
Barça, like other Primera Division clubs that have problems registering players, has put pressure on the League to make the fair play financial But the employers’ association only made a small concession at the beginning of the summer, raising the percentages for the exceeded clubs. Of the salary savings, if initially 40% could be allocated to new signings, now it is 50%. And 60% if he was “a franchise player”, which represented at least 5% of the salary cost. “We come from a pandemic and we are aware that many clubs have problems. But if we open the tap completely and let signing without limitations, we are in danger of stretching our arm more than our sleeve and having problems in the long term. We understand the discomfort of the clubs, but our position is clear. Whoever is overpaid, what he has to do is reduce the wage bill,” explains Javier Tebas.
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More than half of the teams in Primera, one of them Barça, have not yet been able to register any signings
A similar situation already occurred last year. With a week to go before the start of the competition, only 60% of the signings had been registered. This season, however, only 28% are. From the League they take iron and assure that registrations will be accelerated this week. For now, only Athletic Club and Atlético de Madrid have filled and validated the 25 available cards, although both the Basque team and Matalasser have a signing to register who will take the place left vacant by a player who find a way out. Of all the teams in Primera, Real Madrid and Valencia are the only ones who have been able to register the signings they have made. Including, in the case of Madrid, Brahim, who leaves the subsidiary to join the first team. On the other hand, and aside from Barça, there are 10 other clubs that have not been able to register anyone: Alabès (5 additions), Betis (7), Celta (7), Getafe (7), Granada (3), Las Palmas (5 ), Osasuna (3), Rayo (3), Real Sociedad (2) and Sevilla (4).
Signings made by each club in 2023
Girona also have homework to do, as only Sávio Moreira and Daley Blind are registered. Gazzaniga, Borja García, Yangel, Yan Couto and Iván Martín, who were already at the club last year but have a new contract, have not yet been validated. Nor Pablo Torre. They are joined by Bernardo and Juanpe, renewed last year but not yet officially registered. This means that, in the eyes of the League, Míchel’s have 16 registered players. One of them, curiously, Oriol Romeu, who while not valid as a Barça player remains constant, on the employer’s website, as a member of the Girona squad.
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