‘Official’ and ‘Ferran Torres’ are three words that, except for surprise, will appear together on FC Barcelona’s social networks in a multitude of languages announcing the arrival of the attacker from Manchester City as the star reinforcement for this winter.
The signing of the Spanish international is about to close (recognition is already underway in Barcelona), but let it happen Barcelona does not guarantee its immediate registration in LaLiga given the financial complications that squeeze the club and adjust its salary limit set by the competition itself.
The transfer will be closed in an amount close to 55 million fixed euros plus 10 in variables, but for Ferran to appear back in the First Division, Barcelona will have to make adjustments. The arrival of Xavi Hernández and his staff and the renewals of Ansu Fati and Pedri have the club close to its salary cap and thus, the sports management will have to work on giving several starts before registering the Spaniard.
To lighten the salary mass, Barcelona is already planning the departure of five players. As reported by AS, they would be Sergiño Dest, Yusuf Demir (assigned with a mandatory purchase option, the assignment will be canceled), Luuk De Jong, Philippe Coutinho and Samuel Umtiti. These last two will be the ones that leave the most space, as the Brazilian has 22 million chips and the French close to ten. These are two tricky pieces to move given the combination of high pay, injuries and a slump in performance that means they receive little interest from other clubs. With the cancellation of the loan of Demir they will avoid the obligatory payment to Rapid Vienna if the Austrian played ten games with the first team (He stayed at nine) and a downward renewal of Ousmane Dembélé is also being sought.
If the gap is found, Ferran Torres will be able to confirm his return to LaLiga and debut with the Barcelona shirt.
The 25% rule continues to affect Barcelona
For Barcelona, the 25% rule of LaLiga is still in force, which ‘complicates’ these operations because of having exceeded the salary limit in the past. Jose Guerra, LaLiga manager, explained several months ago what it consists of and how it affects this type of situation at Barcelona. “It is the result of the excess of the previous season. It recognizes losses in 2020-21 higher than expected. If you add to the limit that has losses, you would have the normal salary cap. About 500 million euros. It has 700 million budget and can only allocate 90 to the salary limit because balance and sustainability must be maintained. Of those 700, there are about 487 destined to compensate the losses of previous seasons. Due to the impact derived from COVID, the excess will not be penalized. That excess will influence the staff limit for next season and he will have to continue using only 25% of the income to sign “, explained. In other words, in the case of possible sales, of the income derived from these, only 25% can be used for new signings.