Sports Burst - No Barcelona Bankruptcy
Barcelona president says no danger of club going into the red but gives stark picture of Camp Nou club's finances
By Tim Stannard/beIN SPORTS USA
Bartomeu supports Messi's claim that players were behind 70% salary cut as club's income dries up
Barcelona president, Josep Maria Bartomeu, must be fondly reflecting on the time, just a couple of months ago, when there was a CRISIS! over Ernesto Valverde being sacked without a replacement and Quique Setien admitting that he was hanging out with cows when the call came in to take over Barcelona.
Or the furore over the failure to sign a striker during the transfer window and instead bending the transfer rules to pay top dollar for a Leganes forward.
Heck, even losing el Clasico a couple of weeks ago will seem like a relief in comparison to today's problems.
Barcelona are now, like every business on the planet, in a very different world where sacking coaches or losing games of soccer are trivial. After all, one of the big topics of conversation for Bartomeu on Catalan radio on Monday night was bankruptcy and the chances of that happening to Barca by June.
The answer to that possibility was a firm 'no' from the Barcelona boss, and that's partly because of the 70% salary cut to the club's first-team players which Bartomeu says will immediately save Barca up to $18 million.
However, Bartomeu was stark on the situation faced by Barcelona and every other sporting institution at the moment.
"Barcelona has not had any income since 14th March. The museum is not open, there is no TV money, no hospitality money, no ticket money."
Finances were not the only issue facing Bartomeu over the past few days.
Another player rebellion was brewing as well with accusations from Lionel Messi on Monday that the club were spinning the notion that the players were unwilling to make sacrifices to save the team.
Bartomeu confirmed that Messi was right to say that it was the players who stepped up first to suggest the salary cuts, which means that the rest of the club's employees can still receive 100% of their salaries.
"The players never said no to dropping their salary," confirmed the Barcelona president, who continues to play whack-a-mole with controversies at the Catalan club.
There is a double dose of Sports Burst today to cover all of the news. Join Andres Cordero and Kaylyn Kyle at 12PM ET for the Sports Burst live show on Facebook, Youtube and the beIN SPORTS XTRA channel.
And then the new Sports Burst PM returns at 7PM ET on beIN SPORTS to both look back at the day and look ahead to what might be coming on Wednesday.
UEFA prepares for another decision day on future of soccer
Wednesday is shaping up to be a decisive day for European soccer - as much as any kind of decisions can be made in the current truly impossible climate.
UEFA will be gathering together its 55 members in another video conference call, to discuss the short, medium, long, really long and complete guesswork future of European soccer. This time around, Slovenia has hopefully learned to hit the mute button when not talking.
The topics to be discussed by the group are manyfold. Realistically, it is tough to see how the biggest decision of all can be made over when the leagues will return across the continent. COVID-19 still rampant with no end in sight for many nations.
However, there could be guidelines set for each league to make its own arrangements on whether to continue leagues through the summer or annul their current tournaments.
There are numerous other subjects to cover as well - player contracts that expire on June 30th, the summer transfer window and the crucial matter of what can be done with clubs that are fighting to be on the start line when soccer returns.