FC Barcelona are in financial turmoil as they aren’t able to register any of their new signings, Sergio Aguero, Eric Garcia and Memphis Depay. They are also not able to re-sign Messi after his contract ended on 30th June.
La Liga has a strict rule for player salary caps and Barcelona needs to sell multiple players to meet the standard. La Liga president Javier Tebas has now said that he won’t turn a blind eye to the salary cap to let Messi stay at Barcelona
Tebas said to Radio MARCA, via Marca: “No, I won’t [turn a blind eye] for Messi, it’s impossible. There are many workers [at LaLiga] and in the economic control [department] as well.”
“This is a right that the clubs have and we have to safeguard the integrity of LaLiga.”
“We often have to explain [the economic controls] to agents and players because they don’t know about it or think clubs are deceiving them, and we’ve had to explain it in recent years.”
Tebas further added: “We’ll have to analyse everything properly, because if there are dismissals for economic reasons but then they bring in Messi and others… we’d have to look into that.”
“Right now I can only give my opinion, and that is that it is odd that there has been no offer [for Messi] from Manchester City or Paris Saint-Germain.”
“And I firmly believe there isn’t and that the player wants to stay.”
The LaLiga boss also cautioned that player swaps with inflated values would be studied by authorities and commented on why Barcelona and Atletico Madrid are among those most affected by the pandemic and the economic controls.
“The big clubs have been affected when they’ve gone to the limit, as Barcelona did, or when there’s been a storm…” said Tebas.
“In the case of Atletico, we’re talking about an enormous debt, but it’s also true that they have the capacity to repay and refinance it.
“You need to think about budgeting from a longer-term perspective, of about three or four years.”
