On Tuesday, it emerged that La Liga had imposed a fresh set of sanctions on FC Barcelona for breaching the Financial Fair Play regulations.
The sanctions, estimated to be around €800,000, were made on three of Barcelona’s operations last season. This included the capture of Dani Alves, Andreas Christensen, along with the renewal of Ronald Araujo earlier in the year.
Barcelona had subsequently appealed against all three of the decisions. And according to a report from AS, the club’s appeals, or at least one of them, have been heard by the UEFA License Second Instance Committee.
The body has heard Barcelona’s appeal for the signing of Christensen. The Danish international joined from Chelsea earlier in the summer, but Barcelona were deemed to have breached the FFP rules pertaining to the 2021/22 financial year, even though the player did not join until the start of the 2022/23 campaign.
For this reason, the UEFA committee has considered the sanction void, meaning Barcelona now only have to pay €580,000 in fines.
This is the first time UEFA committee has heard such appeals from Barcelona, who have been at odds with La Liga over their strict FFP regulations, that in turn, have crippled the club’s powers in the transfer market.
To add more salt into the wound, it appears La Liga will only allow clubs to utilise 5% of the revenue earned through the sale of club assets.
This could be a blow for Barcelona, who had executed several economic levers to generate fresh revenue and sign players such as Robert Lewandowski and Raphinha.
But with La Liga imposing further sanctions, it remains to be seen what measures the Catalans take to protest the move.