Barcelona will have to raise close to €200million in sale this summer before they can add to their squad, according to La Liga chief Javier Tebas.
‘As of today, Barcelona doesn’t have any room in its budget to spend in the upcoming transfer window,’ LaLiga chief Javier Tebas said on Thursday in London, at the Financial Times’ Business of Football summit.
‘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.’
The La Liga ruling is a direct contradiction to the guidance that Barca president Joan Laporta gave less than a month ago when he claimed the club was in a strong position, vowed to cut £150m from the wage bill, and stated that no player sales would be necessary.
“Getting Antoine Griezmann and Gerard Pique off the wage bill would save the club around €90million (£80m) next season – an amount that was still to be added to the latest league calculation of what Barcelona can spend next summer,” he had told reporters last month.
“We don’t need to sell any important players. We will reinforce the squad.”
Barca spent big last summer on the likes of Robert Lewandowski, Raphinha and Jules Kounde, despite seemingly being hamstrung by monetary issues. That gamble looks to be paying off as Barcelona are leading La Liga and are 1-0 up over el clasico rivals Real Madrid in their Copa del Rey semi-final tiw.
What has really hurt Barcelona this season though is their performance in Europe where they were knocked out of the Champions League in the group stages and were recently knocked out of the Europa League by Manchester United.
The good news for Barcelona is that there are several players in the squad who are of interest to other sides. Frenkie de Jong was the target of a high-profile transfer saga involving Man United throughout much of last summer, with the player refusing to leave the Nou Camp.
Ansu Fati has also been rumoured as a target for United, although he has reportedly recently shut down any links with the Premier League side.
Samuel Umtiti, Hector Bellerin, Clement Lenglet, Alex Collado and Sergino Dest are all currently out on loan and could be made available for sale this summer, with their futures seemingly elsewhere.
