According to La Liga regulations, Dani Olmo may no longer be eligible to play for Barcelona from the beginning of 2025. The former Leipzig player can even leave for free after moving to Camp Nou last summer for £50 million.
La Liga sets a spending limit for each club, in line with their revenue, with debt calculations. If a club goes over the limit, they are forced to take wage cuts or find additional sources of income if they want to sign new players. Barca have been over the spending limit for a long time, letting some players leave to supplement or cut costs. However, that was not enough to successfully sign Dani Olmo.
La Liga 2024-2025 starts on August 17, but Barca had to wait until the third match to debut Dani Olmo. Not only Olmo, Inigo Martinez, Marc Casado and Pau Victor could not start with the first team on the opening day for various reasons. Finally, they had to wait until Ronald Araujo and Andreas Christensen suffered serious injuries and were out for a long time before they were added.
La Liga rules state that if a club loses a player due to injury, and is determined to be out for four months or more, they are allowed to use 80% of the injured player's salary to pay for a new signing. Araujo suffered a hamstring injury while playing for Uruguay at the Copa America and was sidelined for five months. Barca then used that money to sign three young stars: Inigo Martinez, Marc Casado and Pau Victor.
As for Olmo, he was registered because on August 27, Barca reported Christensen's injury to La Liga. It is not clear how serious the Danish star's injury is, but Barca confirmed that he will be out for a long time and the club does not want to wait at least 4 months. Almost immediately, Olmo was registered as an additional player in the context that on August 30, if he still cannot be introduced, the former Leipzig star can leave immediately.
However, trouble still haunts Barca because 80% of Christensen's salary is too little compared to Olmo's salary, especially when the Spanish star also signed a 6-year contract with Blaugrana. After negotiations, Barca was allowed to "temporarily" use Olmo in the first half of the season, while using him while finding a way to compensate, but as December 31, 2024 approaches, they have not yet found any other source of income to handle this matter.
Barca is expected to announce a new sponsorship deal with Nike early next week. However, even if the deal is successful, it will not be enough to handle Olmo's case. At this point, Dani Olmo's side remains calm, knowing that any reaction at this time will only make the situation more complicated and they also know that Barca is trying very hard to handle it.
In the worst case, Olmo will not be able to play again from January 1, 2025. If this midfielder agrees to stay and wait for Barca, that is also a possibility, but how long to wait is something no one can answer. Olmo is at the peak of his career, he certainly does not want to stay at Camp Nou in such a long-term situation of not being able to play.
Not to mention Olmo's case has another negative detail, which is that his license to play in La Liga is only valid until December 31, 2024. Normally, when a player is allowed to play in La Liga, that license will be valid at the same time as the contract with the home team expires. If Barca successfully turns around the money to save Olmo's case this time, they will have to re-register from the beginning for the 26-year-old star's case.
There are also problems with international eligibility. If Olmo is not licensed to play in La Liga, he will not be able to play in the Champions League. UEFA only allows a player to play in the Champions League if he is eligible to play in his home league. In addition, next month's Copa Del Rey and Supercopa will not welcome Olmo if he is not successfully registered by Barca.
Barca are currently trying to resolve the sale of the rights to use Barca Studios. This was once considered a financial lever for the team to have money to cover expenses, but the deal to buy ownership of Barca Studios fell through before this season, contrary to previous calculations. Not only that, Barca are also selling VIP seats at the new Camp Nou stadium and hope that it can bring in hundreds of millions of pounds if successfully purchased in the long term.
