Debt-ridden Barcelona was king of the 2022 transfer window, but at what cost?

No club brought in as much quality as Barcelona did in the recent transfer window, despite its financial woes. In the long term, for better or for worse, this will be known as the Summer of Barcelona

If every football transfer deadline day had played out in a physical market, one would notice distinct characters caught in the mad rush to complete deals before the window slammed shut. There are the panic buyers, the freeloaders, the content-with-my-lot window shoppers, the loaners... and then, there’s Football Club Barcelona in 2022.

On the final day of the recent summer transfer window, Barcelona was the trader that wheeled in a cart filled with shiny merchandise in a desperate attempt to offload some quality wares at any cost, to balance the books after months of burning cash in the market – cash that they apparently do not have.

It is not uncommon for European football clubs to send off players towards the end of a transfer window. In fact, Paris St. Germain, another big-spending club, also went about offloading dead weight on deadline day. But, Barcelona’s activity was noteworthy, because of the crises this highly successful club has gotten into.

“Barcelona are the only club that has no money but then... buys every player they want. I do not know how (they do it). It’s kind of weird, kind of crazy,” said Bayern Munich head coach Julian Nagelsmann.

To sum up Barcelona’s troubles, the club’s debt rose to €1.3 billion last year, and having crossed a stipulated ‘salary limit’, the club was blocked by the Spanish league – La Liga – from registering a host of new players ahead of the 2022-23 season. This ‘salary limit’ is essentially a calculation of revenue against the value of the squad.

Barcelona has gone about circumventing the money problems by restructuring short-term debt into long-term debt by signing huge sponsorship deals – including a €280-million one with Spotify – borrowing €600 million from Goldmann Sachs and partial sale of club assets, such as its TV rights and in-house production studio.

All this financial manoeuvring finally allowed the club to register world-class signings such as Robert Lewandowski from Bayern Munich, Raphinha from Leeds United, and Jules Kounde from Sevilla for a reported sum of €140 million. There were free transfers, too, of players who are presumably paid high wages, including defender Andreas Christensen, midfielder Franck Kessie, and defender Hector Bellerin.