Liga "FFP" - Murcia relegated and Pedro Leon can't play for Getafe

jojojo

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La Liga has been introducing financial controls over the past couple of seasons. There's not much that's fair about finance in La Liga and Liga style FFP has one basic objective, it's to stop clubs going bankrupt. Clubs have to present balanced budgets, letters from the tax office confirming that they're either not in tax debt or that they're meeting their debt repayment schedule, and so on.

I'm not sure how similar that is to the German restructuring that took place a few years ago.
@Sphaero @Balu

Anyway this is the first season that the sanctions have been applied. The first victim was Murcia who were administratively relegated from Liga2 to the (regional based) 2Bs. The 2Bs are a mix of Liga club B teams, semi-pro teams and the odd relegated pro team, desperately scrambling for cash to keep paying the wagebill.

The other victim is Pedro Leon. A 27 year old winger, a "nearly" player who had a season at Real Madrid before returning to Getafe who own him now. However they couldn't balance the budget and he was the name left out - he's now basically sitting out the season on Getafe's payroll but unable to play.
 
What's the point? He is still on their books, still taking out money from their coffers. How does that even help?!
 
Pointed out by a poster @Juve4Life in the newbies - the Pedro Leon saga in more detail.

From Guillen Balague's report on the Sky site:
http://www1.skysports.com/football/...h-changing-how-they-play-says-guillem-balague

Incidentally Balgue's article suggests Getafe's allowed wagebill is €80m - it isn't - I'm assuming that's a transcription error. According to Marca it's €18.7m which puts it at as the 13th highest in La Liga. €80m would mean they have Sevilla/Valencia level money.

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Pedro Leon’s story at Getafe is one that goes beyond a single player and a single club.

This is a situation that has become personal between the player and the club’s president, Angel Torres, who wanted him moved to certain clubs in Qatar and Russia. That would have earned Getafe a lot of money, but the player wasn’t interested in that and wanted to have his say.

With the Financial Fair Play rules that are imposed on the league by the Spanish clubs, Angel Torres found the perfect excuse to prevent Pedro Leon from being part of the squad.

There is a limit on wages – which at Getafe is about 80million euros – and Pedro Leon’s wages took them over that cap. That was used as an excuse to exclude him from the squad. The problem is that the club is still paying his wages, which is a very strange situation, and Angel Torres clearly doesn’t want him in the squad.

The trade union then insisted that the federation give him a license to play and they did so – and so in theory everything is sorted. However, the league says that if he is put onto the pitch (for instance in the Sky Sports live game against Valencia on Monday night) then Getafe will be punished with a 3-0 defeat for the illegal inclusion of a player under the FFP rules.

Getafe coach Cosmin Contra has included 19 players in the squad for that game, rather than the 18 required, so he could be left out. We’ll have to wait and see what happens.

Pedro Leon is thinking of taking the league and Getafe to civil court, which could destroy the Financial Fair Play regulations that have been put in place by the league.

This case is about bullying in the workplace, but it’s also about the league’s belief that unless limits are put on clubs then they will continue to fall into debt.

It’s a fascinating situation.
 
This rule was probably needed in Spain, Racing Santander's future is looking bleak and teams like Merida and Salamanca no longer exist.
 
what is the TV money distribution like nowadays in Spain?

I know it was absolutely ridiculous a couple of years back with Real/Barca fecking over everyone else, but I seem to remember talk of a fairer split being introduced - did it ever change?
 
I once went to see a Murcia game a few years ago when they were in the Spanish Championship equivalent- they drew 1-1 with someone. It wasn't a very good standard of football.
 
Rood said:
what is the TV money distribution like nowadays in Spain?

I know it was absolutely ridiculous a couple of years back with Real/Barca fecking over everyone else, but I seem to remember talk of a fairer split being introduced - did it ever change?
Click to expand...

No change yet. The minimum payment has gone up a bit but the differential is still enormous.

Even after the new collective deal comes in there will be massive disparities. Real Madrid and Barcelona were willing to take a smaller share of a larger pot, provided they continued to get close to what they get now. However that "larger pot" doesn't exist. The economic crisis has more or less driven the only competitor to the main satellite company out of business and the satellite company have lost subscribers. It remains to be seen how the collective deal will work out.
 
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coolredwine said:
What's the point? He is still on their books, still taking out money from their coffers. How does that even help?!
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It doesn't, but it's the kind of anomaly you'd expect when player contracts run for 4/5 years and clubs, with no cash reserves, have to balance their books.

The Murcia case went to court with the Judge in the case ordering Murcia's reinstatement in Liga2 pending full trial over the legality of the rules. On appeal a higher Judge said that it wasn't possible to make that order, given that even after a trial all that could be ordered was financial compensation for the club's loss of income.

It's a similar position now with Leon, his contract says he has to be paid, not that Getafe are allowed to play him. In principle it's no different to him getting suspended for a red card or failing to take a drugs test.
 
jojojo said:
Incidentally Balgue's article suggests Getafe's allowed wagebill is €80m - it isn't - I'm assuming that's a transcription error. According to Marca it's €18.7m which puts it at as the 13th highest in La Liga. €80m would mean they have Sevilla/Valencia level money
Click to expand...

€18.7m? And that is the 13th highest, I knew the players wages of bottom half teams in Spain were small but I didn't know it was that bad, Wigan in the 2012/2013 season had the lowest wage bill in the league with £44m (€55m). That was before the new BT deal also so it's probably higher now.

Rood said:
what is the TV money distribution like nowadays in Spain?

I know it was absolutely ridiculous a couple of years back with Real/Barca fecking over everyone else, but I seem to remember talk of a fairer split being introduced - did it ever change?
Click to expand...

As far as I know it's still about 46% to Barca/Madrid and the other 54% to the rest, I think it's going to become fairer sooner rather than later. Unbelievably Cardiff earned more money (£62m) from finishing bottom than Atletico did from finishing first (£46m), even Bayern only received £40m from winning the Bundesliga.
 
Nanook said:
€18.7m? And that is the 13th highest, I knew the players wages of bottom half teams in Spain were small but I didn't know it was that bad, Wigan in the 2012/2013 season had the lowest wage bill in the league with £44m (€55m). That was before the new BT deal also so it's probably higher now.
Click to expand...

Yes, I posted the wagebills a few days ago. The ratio between the top clubs and the bottom ones in wages terms is 30:1. For comparison in the PL it's something like 5:1
https://www.redcafe.net/threads/liga-the-top-two-pay-almost-30x-wages-of-the-bottom-ones.396657/
 
jojojo said:
I'm not sure how similar that is to the German restructuring that took place a few years ago.
@Sphaero @Balu
Click to expand...
As far as I know, the clubs just have to prove to the German football league that they are able to pay all the bills for the upcoming season. If they can't do that, they won't get a license to play in the league and have to play in a lower league (which one or if one at all depends on their financial situation). There's no wage cap forced on the teams from the football league, there's also nothing comparable to UEFA's FFP which restricts the spending. We don't really need anything like that, because we have the 50+1 rule preventing investors from taking over clubs, so no one really spends significantly more than what they earn anyway. It says that the original club (basically the club members like for example I am one at Bayern) has to own 51% of the voting rights of the professional football department. There are a few exceptions, but they are very difficult to use, so investors, who want short term success, stay away from the league.

Personally I think the Pedro Leon case is really stupid and he has every right to challenge it in court. If the club has to pay his wages anyway, why shouldn't he play? Either force the club to sell him and reduce the wage bill or not. Punish the club, not the player, if they deliberately ignored the rules and signed new players while knowing their wage bill is a problem. Points deduction or even relegation for example, but forcing them to leave a player out of the squad as a punishment? Who comes up with such an idea?
 
coolredwine said:
What's the point? He is still on their books, still taking out money from their coffers. How does that even help?!
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In fairness it should serve as a warning to other clubs. If you cant balance the books then you will be spending money on a player you cant even use. To be honest its one of the few ways you can make FFP work.
 
Balu said:
Personally I think the Pedro Leon case is really stupid and he has every right to challenge it in court. If the club has to pay his wages anyway, why shouldn't he play? Either force the club to sell him and reduce the wage bill or not. Punish the club, not the player, if they deliberately ignored the rules and signed new players while knowing their wage bill is a problem. Points deduction or even relegation for example, but forcing them to leave a player out of the squad as a punishment? Who comes up with such an idea?
Click to expand...

It's thought that he's on €3m gross (€1.6m net) so he's a big slice of the €18.7m wagebill. The problems are two-fold - nobody's willing to pay him those wages and Getafe were trying to get a transfer fee for him.

According to his agent, Leon offered to take a wage cut to help a move go through - but not surprisingly wanted it to be a club that he chose. Sevilla, Hannover and Eintracht Frankfurt were on his list. Sevilla offered €2m rising to €3m but Getafe wouldn't deal, at that point they were asking for €6m. After a few weeks Sevilla gave up and signed Deulofeu. Getafe then lowered the asking price to €4m but the German clubs wouldn't go above €2m.
http://www.cope.es/detalle/Pedro-Le...-el-club-no-acepto-ninguna-oferta-por-el.html

The trouble is Leon's become a test case for La Liga's new rules and a squabble over how much control a player has over his own future.
 
jojojo said:
It's thought that he's on €3m gross (€1.6m net) so he's a big slice of the €18.7m wagebill. The problems are two-fold - nobody's willing to pay him those wages and Getafe were trying to get a transfer fee for him.

According to his agent, Leon offered to take a wage cut to help a move go through - but not surprisingly wanted it to be a club that he chose. Sevilla, Hannover and Eintracht Frankfurt were on his list. Sevilla offered €2m rising to €3m but Getafe wouldn't deal, at that point they were asking for €6m. After a few weeks Sevilla gave up and signed Deulofeu. Getafe then lowered the asking price to €4m but the German clubs wouldn't go above €2m.
http://www.cope.es/detalle/Pedro-Le...-el-club-no-acepto-ninguna-oferta-por-el.html

The trouble is Leon's become a test case for La Liga's new rules and a squabble over how much control a player has over his own future.
Click to expand...
I understand all that. The problem is that contracts already running when those FFP rules are installed can't be included in those rules. If I remember correctly the same happened with the UEFA FFP rules, where all the player contracts signed before 2010 didn't count, because the clubs couldn't know that those rules will be introduced in the future before it was officially announced. You need to give the clubs a chance to adapt, not force them into impossible and stupid decisions. The league could in theory control who they sign from now on and say, they aren't allowed to sign anyone until their wage bill goes under those 18.7m (with a few exceptions for a few years to make it work). But they shouldn't force clubs to deny players with valid contracts the chance to play. That's just not right and it should be challenged in court.
 
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