Breaking down Barcelona's turmoil

Barca stands at the top of the suspended Liga table, and still find themselves in contention in the suspended Champions League -- but FC Yahoo's Ryan Bailey explains how the club's current strength on the field belies the turmoil they are facing at board and front office level.

Video transcript

RYAN BAILEY: Soccer clubs all around the world are suffering due to the COVID-19 outbreak. But the pandemic has seriously exacerbated the turmoil at Barcelona.

Ryan Bailey here for Yahoo Sports. Barcelona are top of the suspended Liga table in line for potential third successive league title. And they remain in the suspended Champions League. And at the start of the season, they announced record revenues of 1 billion euros.

But all this hides the fact that the Blaugranes find themselves in complete chaos due to poor financial management, bad front office decision-making, and a civil war breaking out between players and the board.

Many of the issues stem from club president Joseph Bartomeu, who initially upset Lio Messi and other players last summer by failing to bring Neymar back to the club. As a result of poor squad planning, the club were forced to make a highly controversial emergency signing of Martin Braithwaite in February. when Luis Suárez and Ousmane Dembélé suffered long-term injuries. Braithwaite cost 18 million euros. His club, Leganés, were unable to replace him. And he'll likely not stay in Catalonia beyond the season.

Before that shambles, the board fired manager Ernesto Valverde while Barca were top of the league. It was a protracted and very messy affair. And it transpired that the club didn't really have a replacement lined up, with several candidates turning down the role.

Bartomeu was hit by scandal once again, when it was alleged he had hired a PR company to clean up his image on social media while disparaging his enemies, which included Barca players, including Messi and Gerard Piqué. This is now known as Barcagate.

Star player Messi has been upset by the board several other times this season, including the moment when he clapped back at former team mate Eric Abidal, when he accused the squad for being at fault but Valverde's sacking.

More recently, Messi has taken to his personal Instagram to address the poorly handled 70% pay cut the squad have taken, which he felt cast the players in a bad light.

The Barca soap opera took another turn last week when six of Bartomeu's board members resigned over Barcagate and a general feeling of mismanagement at the club.

Despite their huge revenues, Barca find themselves in a precarious situation right now, due to lost stadium revenues and badly handled transfer activity. Even with the 70% player salary cuts, Barca have now furloughed non-playing staff, suggesting they're in greater financial peril than other elite level clubs.

To conclude, it's a complete mess at front office level in Barcelona, which has led to unrest in the locker room. Bartomeu is ineligible to stand in the next Barcelona elections, and his successor will certainly have their work cut out for them to recover from this ongoing crisis.

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