Money Key in Fabregas Story
It's 85 minutes into the first leg of the Champions League quarter final between Arsenal and Barcelona last March, the London club is trailing the Catalans 2–1. Arsenal need something, quickly, to restore its hopes of progressing.
Like many times before, the glimmer of hope comes from then 22-year-old Fabregas, the young Catalan who left Barcelona to play for Arsenal at 16.
As the nimble playmaker bursts into the opposition's box, he is kicked over the shin by the Barcelona captain, Carlos Puyol.
Fabregas fractures his shin bone in the incident, but that does not stop him from equalising from the penalty spot with only minutes to go.
In the first half, Fabregas had despaired at being shown a yellow card. The booking would rule him out of the following week's second leg in Barcelona.
Ever since Arsenal and Barcelona last met in 2006, the Catalan club had shown a keen interest in Fabregas' services. Above all, his yellow card showed an eagerness to perform against his former club and current courters.
Never-Dying Loyalty?
Fast forward to August 2010.
On Friday, Fabregas told the Arsenal website that despite Barcelona's two offers for his services this summer, he would remain with the club and manager Arsene Wenger for at least another season.
Against the backdrop of his passionate display against Barcelona in March, this decision completes a tidy narrative: the lost Catalonian son could not leave because he owed too much to the club and to Wenger, who had nurtured his talent delivered him safely to where he always wanted to be: at the top of world football.
But as is often the case, the fairy tale only tells part of the truth.
Fabregas is no doubt indebted and attached to Wenger, and it would take a lot to break his allegiance with Arsenal, a club for which he wants nothing more than a return to greatness.
But the loyalty rhetoric only gets us halfway to the real answer, which has a lot to do with one thing: money.
Fans and members of Barcelona expect the club to sign the best players and play the prettiest football, two things it admittedly has made a habit of doing for a long time. But these expectations create a hefty strain on the club's finances.
Last season, Barcelona bought striker Zlatan Ibrahimovic from Italian champions Inter Milan for €46m. As part of the deal, Barcelona's Cameroonian striker Samuel Eto'o joined Inter on a 5-year contract.
This summer, after an inconsistent first season by Ibrahimovic, the Spanish champions signed Valencia and Spain's top scorer David Villa. He cost another €40m, not one year after the club's last major offensive signing.
Obviously, luring these players in costs money. Despite the appeal of playing for Barcelona, Fabregas' signature required cash, and a lot of it, precisely what Barcelona found themselves to be lacking this summer.
Weak vs. Strong Finances
In early July, Barcelona's new president Sandro Rosell announced that his club was taking out a €150m loan to handle some pressing finances. Barcelona had not managed to pay its players their wages for the month of June.
Rosell stressed that the loan had been planned for some time, but that did little to stifle speculation that the club was in a delicate financial situation.
A few weeks after the loan was announced, an audit revealed that Barcelona had worked up a gross debt of €442m after losing €77m last season.
Arsenal, meanwhile, is a club whose manager has a master's degree in economics.
Wenger has rarely been one to splash out on players, and his club's strong finances stand out among Europe's increasingly debt-ridden teams.
In February this year, the club announced an increase in profits over the previous six months by €12m, adding up to a total of €42m in pre-tax profits.
What Wenger wasn't about to do, then, was trade his key player for money Arsenal really could do without. Especially when Barcelona were in no position to cough up the kind of money they paid for Ibrahimovic last year.
At 23, Fabregas will be at the peak of his powers in the coming seasons, and his presence will be of immeasurable importance in Arsenal's various title-bids this season.
When it comes to offloading players, Wenger, practically Arsenal's chief economist, can smell an unfavourable deal from a mile away.
That sensibility, compounded with Fabregas' admiration for the manager and love for the club, put an end to the transfer drama of the summer.
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