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[Albion] Ansu Fati **Signed On Loan 01/09**
- Thread starter El Turi
- Start date
Good post.
There is reportedly a rule that allows Barca to spend 80% of Gavi's wages for remainder of this season on another player without affecting La Liga Financial Fair play rules. But Ansu is on higher wages than Gavi so even theoretically wouldn't be possible to fit him into Salary Cap Limit (SCL) using that rule.
Very restrictive SCL rules are not only problematic for Barca but for most La Liga clubs. Real Madrid, Athletic Bilbao (because of their Basque only philosophy they don't sign many players, in fact they've signed none last summer) and Real Sociedad (they are still living off that big money Alexander Isak's sale to Newcastle last year but tbf they are also very well organized club with lot of homegrown players and usually spending smart on the market) are only clubs who had no problems registering their signings last summer.
Obviously no comparision to the Premier League or Saudi Pro League and not even Ligue 1 (well, PSG mostly with their spending spree overpaying all forwards they could find) but even Serie A and Bundesliga teams have spend double the money than La Liga clubs last summer.
If we look at a club like Villarreal who regularly play in Europe. They've sold starters Nicolas Jackson (Chelsea), Pau Torres (A.Villa) and Chukwueze (AC Milan) for close to 100m € and they could only spend around 10m on Sorloth, other signings were free agents. It's true they've renovated stadium recently so some money went there but it's hard to stay competitive when you have so many limitations so no surprise to see them really struggling so far.
And ofc we are talking about what should be one of the better teams in the league. Situation is even worse for smaller clubs who need to sell their best young players (usually also cheaper than they would want to because of stupid obligatory release clauses in Spain) and then replace them with cheaper and/or older players (young talents are logically more expensive than 30+ veterans).
There is a big lack of good strikers. Benzema is gone and Lewandowski is declining drastically. We've signed Vitor Roque (will talk about him more later) who will hopefully turn out well and Endrick will join RM next summer (Mbappe probably too although you never know with him - as a Barca fan would ofc hate to see him in Madrid but OTOH would be a good news for the league in general to get arguably the best young player in the world) but there are currently no exciting young strikers in La Liga.
Nicolas Jackson had a breakthrough last season at Villarreal and Chelsea immediately bought him. Samu Omorodion (Atletico have signed him this summer from Granada for 6m - proof of stupid low release clauses I've talked about above, a player of his potential would be sold for at least 15-20m in most other leagues - and loaned to Alaves to develop) is probably the closest to an exciting young striker, he gave our defense all kind of troubles in last game before international break. But most people who don't follow La Liga probably never heard of him.
Bellingham is a top scorer (ofc not a striker) and behind him you have Atletico's duo Morata and Griezmann and Osasuna's Budimir who are all in their thirties. And then there is Ukrainian international Artem Dovbyk who is 26 and signed for Girona in summer.
Speaking about Girona. Don't want to take anything away from them because they have a very good coach, play nice football and fully deserve to be top of the table. Don't see them "doing a Leicester" but could definitely qualify for CL.
But question here is how would they do without the City Football Group connections? For anyone who doesn't know their chairman is Pep's brother. I'm not saying CFG is directly financing them (wouldn't be surprised if they do though) but they have some of their loanees, especially Yan Couto and Savinho (he's officially a Troyes's player but they're also one of the CFG's clubs) who are key players. City also sold them Yangel Herrera for (probably) a discount price.
And to finance signings of Dovbyk and Herrera Girona sold Santi Bueno to Wolves where he has played 6 minutes so far for 12m€. Wouldn't be surprised if this transfer was part of the deal in the Matheus Nunes's sale to City so CFG helped one of their clubs to get some money and improve the team. And pretty sure Girona can also use CFG's scouting network/knowledge.
Anyway, reports say Barca will use those "saved wages" from Gavi to either bring a midfielder like Lo Celso on loan or to register 18 year old Brazilian striker Vitor Roque who we've signed in summer with a plan to bring him before the 2024/25 season but an option to advance his transfer to January transfer window if we'll find a way to register him.
Roque is highly regarded in Brazil and was scoring for fun for Club Athletico Paranaense (CAP) before ankle injury in September. He has now recovered and should play on Saturday.
Brazilian Serie A will end in two weeks and club plans to bring Roque to Barcelona in mid-December and give him time to adapt before registering him in January (maybe could even register him in December outside of official TW as per La Liga rules clubs can replace longterm - at least 4 months - injured players within 30 days but not sure it's worth to go through probably some pretty big bureaucratic obstacles to have Roque available for 2-3 games in December).
Barca is considering different scenarios but one of solutions is for CAP to loan him until summer before joining officially. Would be easier to register him if only his wages for next 6 months would be calculated in SCL without amortization costs (transfer fee/length of the contract). But not sure LFP president Javier Tebas (who is a thorn in our side for years) will allow that. So we'll probably have to find another way.
Anyway, signing Roque is another reason why I think Barca has already given up on Ansu longterm. As I've said in previous posts I'd prefer to keep him and sell likes of Raphinha, Ferran Torres and Lewandowski way before Fati but problem is they are all recent signings who still have lot of unamortized value on the books and would need to get concrete offers so selling them would make sense from a FFP perspective. Maybe Saudis can save us and buy Lewa (I think he's more likely going to MLS though but ofc they won't pay any serious fee unlike SA clubs) or Raphinha who reportedly has some very good offers from Arabia but who I think would prefer to return to England.
But with these players underperforming (and also being old in Lewa's case) is much more profitable to sell a homegrown player like Fati when his full transfer fee is a net benefit for the club. I think we'll gladly accept any offer above 40-50m €. Besides % of future sale we could try to include a buy-back clause just in case he fullfills his potential one day. Unlikely we would ever use that clause but we've included them in most sales of young talents lately. None of them obviously had a pedigree of Ansu. Closest to that is Nico Gonzalez who played 20+ games for us in 21/22 season before being loaned to Valencia last season. He was sold to Porto in summer for 8m€ and Barca has buy back clause of around 30m but he's not playing much in Portugal so very unlikely he'll ever return.
Last edited:
- Oct 20, 2022
- 7,247
So what happens now - without us knowing the extent of Fati’s injury or the specific clauses that were included in the contract, which team assumes the risk of injury under the contract? Any guesses?
Hopefully he won be out for more than a couple of weeks with just a fatigue strain in his thigh but more than that, it is looking like an expensive contract just got more ‘expensive’ more importantly a massive disappointment after all the excitement of Barca signing him over to us to bring his game up to his former self.
Very sad for the lad
Ansu Fati se lesiona con el Brighton
Malas noticias para el Brighton y el Barça con la lesión de Ansu Fati. El delantero azulgrana, cedido en el conjunto de Roberto de Zebri, ha hecho saltar las alarmas al pedir el cambio después de sentir un problema físico en el muslo en el partido contra el Nottingham Forest.
www.sport.es
He's not dead and buried quite yet!!So what happens now - without us knowing the extent of Fati’s injury or the specific clauses that were included in the contract, which team assumes the risk of injury under the contract? Any guesses?
Hopefully he won be out for more than a couple of weeks with just a fatigue strain in his thigh but more than that, it is looking like an expensive contract just got more ‘expensive’ more importantly a massive disappointment after all the excitement of Barca signing him over to us to bring his game up to his former self.
Very sad for the lad
Ansu Fati se lesiona con el Brighton
Malas noticias para el Brighton y el Barça con la lesión de Ansu Fati. El delantero azulgrana, cedido en el conjunto de Roberto de Zebri, ha hecho saltar las alarmas al pedir el cambio después de sentir un problema físico en el muslo en el partido contra el Nottingham Forest.
Looked like a thigh strain. Most worrying aspect he went down with no one around him and knew he was done straight away. One month out I reckon.
His touch and movement are great, and there is no doubt that some of the glimpses have been simply sublime, but weighing up what we are paying vs contribution, sadly it’s not stacking up for me.
The misses vs Sheff Utd were really frustrating.
And of course, unfortunately he’s now injured, and his return will need to be carefully managed…..
I’d imagine he’s as frustrated as some of us are…..
Pervis has a knee injury doesn’t he ? Original injury was hammy but he did his knee v Ajax and has since been seen in a knee brace (including on his own insta).
Mancgull
Well-known member
That’s what I thought too.
Given his age, first time in England etc it was always very likely that would need time to adapt. Providing injuries don’t affect him too much I would expect him to finish the season at full ability.
We don’t know…….but it was odd watching from the stands at Ajax. He never looked right, clearly wasn’t 100% and his hammy was heavily strapped but it seems as though he has a different injury now. Could well have been as a result of or trying to protect the original one perhaps but no-one on here knows
Maybe a gamble that didn’t pay off - our injury crisis means this is likely to happen (Lamptey yesterday a further example perhaps).
Really hope you’re right.
I guess I was anticipating him hitting the ground running a bit more…..
- Oct 20, 2022
- 7,247
Tbh It’s beginning to make me a little irked at the industry, the FA, that our players are becoming so prone to injury - yes, I know they get paid silly money but that doesn’t excuse how crowded the fixtures are now and what we are asking of them over the course of a season - it’s not just the matches but the international travel - the intensity of training etc. Something is a little off with the sport that 5 EPL teams have 10 or more injured players, some with season defining injuries - I can’t remember when it used to be this bad - nearly 200 players on the injury list 4 months into the season. Lamptey on the pitch after a month off before getting injured again - it can’t be dismissed as ‘Lamptey is prone to injury’, you’d expect him to get through 40 mins of football at least before getting injured again - and Pervis, 12 minutes on the pitch after 10 weeks off at Ajax before going back in with a new injury - a case of accommodating a weakened thigh muscle? - Perfect examples of the need to fully recover before playing surely?We don’t know…….but it was odd watching from the stands at Ajax. He never looked right, clearly wasn’t 100% and his hammy was heavily strapped but it seems as though he has a different injury now. Could well have been as a result of or trying to protect the original one perhaps but no-one on here knows
ewe2
Well-known member
I for one am still waiting on this player to manage our league ……At the moment I see very little. Let’s hope that changes!!
AstroSloth
Well-known member
- Dec 29, 2020
- 1,474
He has 4 goals and an assist in 13 games, most of them part cameos and hasn't had a run of games.
Also shown a lot of bright sparks which are promising for the rest of the season.
Yep.
Premier League player comparison tool is always good for these sorts of things. Statistically he's very similar to Adingra when it comes to attacking (Adingra does more defending because our wingers have to the way we play). He also has one of the best touches in the team, is genuinely two footed and shoots early (his shooting accuracy is better than most PL players but sometimes keepers like it hit early).
What's more is he has the potential to get better and better as the season progresses, which is why I hope this latest injury is just a strain. When available he's very difficult to play against. But, as others have said, we don't want to pay a lot just to have him on the treatment table (though, of course, you could sign a massively expensive player permanently and see him do an ACL in his first game, luck comes into it).
His stats compared to Adingra in Europe are better. He's a player with European experience that is absolutely vital.
Always remember blooms reaction with this guy. He had an interview where he said twice he was very expensive. I think the risk models probably had his loan fee as not worth it but we had to appease RDZ at the time.
I think he's been worth it so far. If we can get 25ish games out of him this season and 8/9 goals it's money pretty well spent.
I think he's been worth it so far. If we can get 25ish games out of him this season and 8/9 goals it's money pretty well spent.
…plus the knock-on effect on other players thinking of coming here. If he can, anyone can.
aolstudios
Well-known member
This ^
- Nov 15, 2006
- 4,648
Shame Kudus turned us down, he’d have been a big plus for us. As, nearly always, money talks though and will continue to do so