Barcelona was arguably the most active club on the transfer market, signing the likes of Robert Lewandowski, Jules Kounde, Franck Kessie, and Andreas Christensen, among others. It also appears more moves could still be coming as the Spanish giants eye Bernardo Silva and Marcos Alonso.

While Joan Laporta has managed to get Barca out of the financial gutter after being forced to sell Lionel Messi a year ago, they aren't in the clear with La Liga's financial fair play rules, which are among the strictest in Europe. That means none of their new players are registered yet and it could result in Kessie and Christensen ultimately leaving Barcelona as free agents. Via ESPN:

“Stripped back in the simplest terms possible, the limit is essentially a calculation of what the club can afford based on revenue against outgoings and debt. It is also applied prior to signings so if a club does not meet the criteria laid out by the league, they can't register new players.”

“The spending caps shift all the time, but at the end of last season, Barca's cap was -€144m (it was around €600m prior to the pandemic), the only negative limit in Spain, prompted by losses across the previous campaign of over €400m. Barcelona's wage bill, meanwhile, including amortisation payments, remains around €500m. While they are outside of their limit, the league only allows them to spend a fraction of what they make in savings on wages, whether through reductions or player exits, and in fees.”

As you can see, Barcelona is certainly in trouble. La Liga isn't cutting them any slack and being in the negative of the spending cap is far from ideal. Basically, the club must sell more assets, including their television rights and out-of-favor players, in order to make them eligible to register the signings. New talent with smaller salaries would be easier to register, such as Christensen and Lewandowski.

It's a messy situation that Barcelona must figure out in a hurry or else they'll be without a total of seven players once the league campaign starts, also failing to register the new contracts of Sergio Roberto and Ousmane Dembele, who penned new extensions recently.