Barcelona have certainly tested the limits of their fans’ trust in recent years, and for a third straight summer, it looks as if their drama trying to register players will go down to the final days of the transfer window. This is despite President Joan Laporta declaring the club would be back within their salary limit earlier this year, early in July claiming that they could afford to sign players like Nico Williams.
Williams would have cost €62m for Barcelona to activate his release clause, the same price Dani Olmo cost them from RB Leipzig if all of his objectives are met. On Friday, Barcelona manager Hansi Flick confirmed that Olmo would not feature in their season debut against Valencia due to fitness issues, but he is yet to be registered with La Liga.
Speaking to one of his regular correspondents on Jijantes, Gerard Romero was questioning not only of the club’s actions, but the information they leak out.
“Me, right now, I don’t believe the club now. The time has come when I just don’t believe them, and I feel like that, I’m sorry Lluis. I feel like that, because the club do not meet the deadlines that they put out in recent months. And I don’t to fall into the trap of generating excitement about players who could come, when you are spending it I don’t know where the whole b***** summer, not cleaning out the squad, and then you get to the 14th of August with the water at your throat.”
“If on Saturday the players are in the squad, we are not going to congratulate them, because they are doing the work they should have done. And not in the deadlines they should have. If the players are registered, we should praise the sporting director [Deco] – you can play with my balls.”
“Because he will have done his job when he should have done his job before, and not on the 14th of August, with the water at our necks, and waiting to see if we will register players or not.”
Romero’s furious rant ended in accusing those at the club of being mercenaries.
“Now I am not speaking as Gerard Romero the journalist or communicator, I am speaking as Gerard Romero Barcelona fan. Someone who feels the weight of the badge. And I get the feeling that those at the club do not feel the Barcelona colours, but the colour of bank notes.”
Meanwhile Romero is not the only one to have lost his temper. One of the more senior correspondents at Sport and Gol David Bernabeu Reverter was equally disdainful of the club, as he spoke about Nico Williams.
“Barcelona aren’t making a fool of themselves not signing Nico, Barcelona are making a fool of themselves leaking out and verbalising in recent months that at this point they would be within their salary limit in the 1:1 rule, and not only are they not in the 1:1 rule, they can’t even register players. Not even your big signing which is Dani Olmo.”
“This is the drama for a third straight year. So that means that three-and-a-half years after arriving as President, Joan Laporta still has to do his homework. This is the problem.”
Meanwhile Nacho Pena of RadioMarca is not a Barcelona insider nor closely linked to the club, but he too took the chance to sound off on the Blaugrana, as Nico Williams made his season debut for Athletic on Thursday night.
“Summer after summer we see what Barça’s project is… Would it be better for Nico Williams to be at Barca watching the clock to see if they sign him up for tomorrow.”
“I want to think that there are many cules who have the blaugrana seny [sensibleness]. That thoughtful and self-critical seny. I’ve spoken to more and more Barca fans who are really at the edge of sanity. What I criticise them for is their immobility. They have to go out into the streets and they have to demand that they become a respectable club again, because right now they are the laughing stock.”
At the time of writing, veteran defender Inigo Martinez has been registered before their clash with Valencia, but Olmo, Vitor Roque, Pablo Torre, Pau Victor and Alex Valle are not.