Joan Laporta

[te amo barca]

Tell me that incredible squad. Who? Maybe De Jong. Griezzmann will be again a non entity, it's not Messi who sabotaged him, he is just overrated. Pedri is too young, Fati is also very young and he comes after a very serious injury. Than we have some washed up veterans like Busquets, Alba and Pique, inconsistent and not to good young prospects in Dembele and Dest. And the new ''signings'' that remains to be seen if we can register. And they are all underwhelming at least. So what is this incredible squad you are talking about? Sevilla was pretty close to us last year with Messi being Pichichi winner. I think they will leapfrog us. And we have the shittest manager in the first 5 teams in Spain. Let's see.

Stop whining. I guarantee you that Barca makes top 4 this season. If they don't, I will be taking a break from this forum for 6 months. Let's make a bet: do you agree to the conditions? If Barca finishes top 4, it will be you who leaves this forum for 6 months. Fuck it, let's make it a year.

I'm willing to make this bet with anyone whining that Barca will finish in the EL places.

 

[khaled_a_d]

That just sounds an awful lot like he doesn't actually know if that's going to be the case. Which would be exactly what I'm talking about. Laporta shouldn't sign players before it is actually officially confirmed that these can be registered.

And that isn't possible, La Liga won't review that before the official end of the 20-21 season which concludes on June 30.
They can't give Barca guarantee of any signing before it happens.
So, again, you are asking the club to concede defeat in the market which is both stupid and not realistic.

The way I see it Barca has bigger issues than top 4 finishes at this point. 90% of the revenue is dumped just into wages (after Messi left that is), meaning that this number has to be reduced either way. Yes, it will cut into revenue, but more importantly it cuts costs which is a bigger issue. If Barca doesn't want to go bankrupt and become a private company at some point then it is unavoidable that the club will eat dirt for the next 5 or even 10 years. So top 4 finishes should already not be a priority anyway. Barca has to phase out the high earning top stars and work with cheap players and whatever is coming from La Masia (which at the moment isn't even too bad anyway), that's just the only way to go forward at this point even if it sounds boring.

The 1B debts is one of our last worries as long as we can get back to gettin over 500M revenue which can be done. Our main problem is keeping revenue and wages within its limit while not selling assets, and all are very attenable, club already got B negative in economic ranking which isn't that bad anyway.
Almost all of our high earners will be out of the club by 2023 anyway, there is no "5 or 10 years" survival here, it is 2 seasons at most.

We are sporting club, the moment we stop being competitive we sacrifice our revenue

Saying top 4 should be absolute priority.

Edit: And we already earned more than 21M of signings (along many other variables) while saving the salaries of players like Firpo, Alena, Trincao, half of Pique salary etc.
It seems even if Liga decided to fuck us up, we will at worst loan one of those players.

 

[Nazario1985]

Stop whining. I guarantee you that Barca makes top 4 this season.

Top 4 in the weakest version of LL since ages is a cockroach performance.

It's hard to see but we are becoming the farmers league.

 

[SmilerBam]

Stop whining. I guarantee you that Barca makes top 4 this season. If they don't, I will be taking a break from this forum for 6 months. Let's make a bet: do you agree to the conditions? If Barca finishes top 4, it will be you who leaves this forum for 6 months. Fuck it, let's make it a year.

I'm willing to make this bet with anyone whining that Barca will finish in the EL places.

I never ever said it's a certainty we lose CL place. I said it's a posibility, underlying how bad the squad is.

 

[Messigician]

I do not think we are better than Villarreal atm

 

[Yannik]

And that isn't possible, La Liga won't review that before the official end of the 20-21 season which concludes on June 30.
They can't give Barca guarantee of any signing before it happens.
So, again, you are asking the club to concede defeat in the market which is both stupid and not realistic.

Which means that before June 30 there should not have been any signings if there is no green light that these can be registered. After that there is 2 months time to go through your options. I mean that much should be obvious.

The 1B debts is one of our last worries as long as we can get back to gettin over 500M revenue which can be done. Our main problem is keeping revenue and wages within its limit while not selling assets, and all are very attenable, club already got B negative in economic ranking which isn't that bad anyway.

BBB is actually bad though. And yet these credit ratings mean basically nothing at all as 2008 has shown.

Almost all of our high earners will be out of the club by 2023 anyway, there is no "5 or 10 years" survival here, it is 2 seasons at most.

We are sporting club, the moment we stop being competitive we sacrifice our revenue

Saying top 4 should be absolute priority.

Everytime this was claimed in the past 6 years the high earners simply replaced by other high earners.
Your revenue isn't covering your expenses. So the revenue isn't the problem. It's the expenses.
And now your revenue will pummel anyway. So the priority should be cost reduction asap. The squad was already competetive for top 4, it didn't require to gamble with Aguero, Depay and co for it.

Edit: And we already earned more than 21M of signings (along many other variables) while saving the salaries of players like Firpo, Alena, Trincao, half of Pique salary etc.
It seems even if Liga decided to fuck us up, we will at worst loan one of those players.

At worst that plan also fails if noone wants to loan them, just like noone wanted to buy the deadwood..
And even if they will, the point still stands that this is a gamble and bad business.

 

[Windhook]

And now your revenue will pummel anyway. So the priority should be cost reduction asap. The squad was already competetive for top 4, it didn't reqquire to gamble with Aguero, Depay and co for it.

Remember all the discussions this spring on signing Haaland and such for 150M+, selling Griezmann and Dembele? I don't blame Laporta, he just faced the reality of completely bankrupt club. I don't expect any other transfer from this point on. And I'm somehow glad we are no longer living in dreamland having conversation on signing Haaland, Mbappe, etc.

 

[khaled_a_d]

Everytime this was claimed in the past 6 years the high earners simply replaced by other high earners.

True, but that was a different board.
We have set wage limits for every new contracts, so now we are sure it isn't happening.
So not sure what are you saying here.

Which means that before June 30 there should not have been any signings if there is no green light that these can be registered. After that there is 2 months time to go through your options. I mean that much should be obvious.

The only obvious thing is this is an absolute non sense.
Even rigid rules of Liga allow you transfers no matter what if you are saving money, which we did.
The club brought a player from loan, and signed 3 free agents, which free agents was going to be available after June?!!

BBB is actually bad though. And yet these credit ratings mean basically nothing at all as 2008 has shown.

It isn't bad though, more of "Ok-ish", and what does 2008 have anything to do with current club finances that is owned by members and not stock market or real estate?

Your revenue isn't covering your expenses. So the revenue isn't the problem. It's the expenses.

Which has been lowered, and sure plenty of work need to be done there.
Fans coming back to stadium will be huge relief when it happens. Current expenses is good if it was happening before covid.
And how revenue not covering expenses means revenue isn't a problem? It means both are problems.

And now your revenue will pummel anyway. So the priority should be cost reduction asap. The squad was already competetive for top 4, it didn't require to gamble with Aguero, Depay and co for it.

So, you suggest that losing CL money is ok since revenue will decrease anyway? Gotcha

The squad was already competetive for top 4, it didn't require to gamble with Aguero, Depay and co for it.

There is very minimal gamble here. Those players are signed almost under their market value under favorable conditions.
Aguero has 1 year granted and basically on "add-ons" contract, Depay and Eric accepted lower offer than other clubs. Emerson is back from loan.
And we were closer to 4th than 2nd, now we are losing Messi we might be closer to 5th than 3rd actually. We needed reinforcement and the signings was the bar minimum.

At worst that plan also fails if noone wants to loan them, just like noone wanted to buy the deadwood..
And even if they will, the point still stands that this is a gamble and bad business.

The point doesn't stand at all, the squad needed new players, that was fact. Laporta signed the bar minimum and he opted for the best interest of the club with almost minimal risk.
It was either there was going to be exception and relief in the summer, and this is necessary investment to correct the situation of the club and improve the future (while making least convincing effort for Messi) or that was no way Liga accept relief of the rules, and in such case we can find ways to register those players to keep us at least pretenders in the league.
In both cases, this was a must do. There wasn't other options.

And please, can you enlighten me which of those players aren't transferable? Emerson? We already rejected couple of offers for him.
Eric: He already accepted a huge wage cut, after already accepting lower offer to City and others, many Liga clubs would love to have him.
Depay: Same thing, on very team friendly wage.
Aguero: The only debatable one, and even him he probably won't lose sleep if we cut him lose or waited to register him later. Not like he had any offer elsewhere.
So, basically only gamble was Aguero, and he signed for very low salary.

 

[te amo barca]

I never ever said it's a certainty we lose CL place. I said it's a posibility, underlying how bad the squad is.

So you're just backtracking and looked for an excuse to moan. Don't do that anymore

 

[Yannik]

True, but that was a different board.
We have set wage limits for every new contracts, so now we are sure it isn't happening.
So not sure what are you saying here.

That new players shouldnt be signed if there is no certainity that they can be registered. Hell.. doesn't matter if they are on a wage cap, they are still getting a wage. Which you might have just aswell drained down the toilet.

The only obvious thing is this is an absolute non sense.
Even rigid rules of Liga allow you transfers no matter what if you are saving money, which we did.
The club brought a player from loan, and signed 3 free agents, which free agents was going to be available after June?!!

If there were no worldclass free agents available at June 30, then maybe don't go for worldclass free agents to begin with. Do you realize that Barca is not in the position to shop at the top of the market and should not proceed to do so?
You have an academy, and it's not even that bad right now. At worst promote some players from there to fill gaps. Otherwise the squad was already in top 4 reach.

It isn't bad though, more of "Ok-ish", and what does 2008 have anything to do with current club finances that is owned by members and not stock market or real estate?

Nothing. It simply is to underline credit ratings mean fuck all and since then every investor and creditor has their own ways to analyse the risk of doing business with Barca.
And BBB isn't even good, companies below A- get flagged and lender wouldn?t let a borrower take insurance or have bank accounts with an institution with a BBB- credit rating because of the risks that they might not be able to pay out on a claim or go bust and monies in the bank accounts are lost.

Which has been lowered, and sure plenty of work need to be done there.
Fans coming back to stadium will be huge relief when it happens. Current expenses is good if it was happening before covid.
And how revenue not covering expenses means revenue isn't a problem? It means both are problems.

So, you suggest that losing CL money is ok since revenue will decrease anyway? Gotcha

Current expenses STILL mean you'd be making losses then. 90% of the revenue is already going into just wages after wage cuts renegotiations which were mainly just agreed for the remainder of Covid.

Of course both are the problem. But even at the peak when Barca was winning left and right and before Covid was a thing, Barca already made insane losses, because they were living above their means. So expect that to continue and even worsen when revenue goes down unless a DRASTIC cut happens today and not tomorrow or in 2-3 years. If increasing or maintaining revenue is not possible, then cutting costs asap is the only remaining way to make profit.

And please, can you enlighten me which of those players aren't transferable? Emerson? We already rejected couple of offers for him.
Eric: He already accepted a huge wage cut, after already accepting lower offer to City and others, many Liga clubs would love to have him.
Depay: Same thing, on very team friendly wage.
Aguero: The only debatable one, and even him he probably won't lose sleep if we cut him lose or waited to register him later. Not like he had any offer elsewhere.
So, basically only gamble was Aguero, and he signed for very low salary.

If the solution to this issue to resell or loan a signing you just made, then this should already be a big indication to you that the whole thing isn't actually all as supersmart as you claim it is.
When are they even hoping to know if they need to sell someone or not? Next week? In 2 Weeks? Are they gonna wait until the 25th of August to decide if Emerson/Depay etc should be loaned out, because whatever deal you get that late would be a panic deal.

 

[FinBarcelonafan]

Let's not Inter this.. We are lucky we only lost Messi so far.

 

[Yannik]

Anyway pointless to debate the ifs and whens. We'll have 3 more weeks of Keeping Up With The Catalans to find out how brilliant or awful all this ends.

 

[Luftstalag14]

The way I see it Barca has bigger issues than top 4 finishes at this point. 90% of the revenue is dumped just into wages (after Messi left that is), meaning that this number has to be reduced either way. Yes, it will cut into revenue, but more importantly it cuts costs which is a bigger issue. If Barca doesn't want to go bankrupt and become a private company at some point then it is unavoidable that the club will eat dirt for the next 5 or even 10 years. So top 4 finishes should already not be a priority anyway. Barca has to phase out the high earning top stars and work with cheap players and whatever is coming from La Masia (which at the moment isn't even too bad anyway), that's just the only way to go forward at this point even if it sounds boring.

Of course cutting expenses, especially the wage bill is crucial, essential and absolutely core, which is what Laporta has been working on. It must be pointed out that it is not an easy task, you basically rely on the good will of the players to carry forward since you can't force them to do it and you can't just unilaterally terminate their contracts. So this will take a lot of time and efforts from Laporta and the club.

At the same time, Barca is Barca so there will always be expectations. We are expected to fight for all trophies, how matter how slim the chances will be. Finishing top 4 is important not just for the pride or prestige or the club, practically qualifying for the CL will provide big financial boost to the club that otherwise would not have (playing in the EL gets you much less broadcast and prize money from UEFA than playing in the CL), that alone makes it important for us to strive for the top 4 in the league.

 

[Yannik]

Of course cutting expenses, especially the wage bill is crucial, essential and absolutely core, which is what Laporta has been working on. It must be pointed out that it is not an easy task, you basically rely on the good will of the players to carry forward since you can't force them to do it and you can't just unilaterally terminate their contracts. So this will take a lot of time and efforts from Laporta and the club.

At the same time, Barca is Barca so there will always be expectations. We are expected to fight for all trophies, how matter how slim the chances will be. Finishing top 4 is important not just for the pride or prestige or the club, practically qualifying for the CL will provide big financial boost to the club that otherwise would not have (playing in the EL gets you much less broadcast and prize money from UEFA than playing in the CL), that alone makes it important for us to strive for the top 4 in the league.

I am sure Laporta is doing efforts to cut wages, that's not what I worry about.
My concern is that signing new players without actually even knowing if they can be registered is not fitting the objective.

Like the other guy said, Laporta signed players in the hopes that La Liga relaxes FFP. Or in the hopes that later on deadwood might still be sold. He didn't know if that was actually the case, but he went forth anyway as he optimistically assumed something will somehow happen and everyone can be registered.
Let's name it like it is: He is gambling here.

 

[jamrock]

So basically he shouldn't have signed those players on a free, which means not attempting to improve the team, & we would also end up losing Messi anyways. How would that make things better, we still have to compete can't just lay over & play dead.