September 2, 2022
The brief from today:
Transfer drama for Bamba Dieng
Marseille and Senegal forward, Bamba Dieng, had quite the eventful transfer deadline day. The 22-year-old was being courted by Lorient, when Leeds United—looking for depth after losing an attacker to injury—stepped in with a €10 million bid that Marseille accepted. With a move to Leeds appearing all but certain as the player was at the private airport in Marseille, Nice lodged a €12 million offer for Dieng’s services. This proposal wasn’t only more appealing for Marseille, Dieng himself preferred the idea of staying in France. Suddenly the Leeds option was quashed, and the Senegalese forward made his way to nearby Nice to perform his medical before signing for the fellow Ligue 1 side. Well, despite medicals being considered formalities, occassionally they do flag issues with players, and that was the case with Dieng. The Nice medical staff discovered a knee issue that they couldn’t overlook, and as a result the rare, but still possible, outcome of a failed medical forced the transfer to collapse. There are reports that a technicality exists in France which allows transfers to still take place after the deadline provided the player is moving from one Ligue 1 side to another. Whether this option indeed exists, or if it will be utilized by Dieng, Marseille, and Nice, remains to be seen. That said, even without that potential final twist, Dieng will now be added to the list of some of the more dramatic transfer deadline day stories.
Transfer deadline day drama for Bamba Dieng
UEFA hands down FFP “punishments”
Recent reports circulated that UEFA were nearing decisions on how European clubs performed regarding Financial Fair Play (FFP). The financial period reviewed included 2018, 2019, 2020, 2021, and 2022. Typically FFP covers a three-year period, but due to the financial impact of COVID, clubs were granted an additional two years to prove their financial health. With all that considered, the review has concluded, and it determined that eight clubs were in breach of FFP, while an additional 19 would be “monitored closely”. Among the eight teams that failed to adhere to FFP—PSG, Inter, Marseille, Monaco, Juventus, Roma, and Milan—PSG are the primary culprits and have received the largest fine. In total, the Ligue 1 side have been handed a €65 million fine, but all eight teams have agreed to settlement agreements that will allow them to only pay 15 percent of their respective fines. The clubs are liable for the remaining 85 percent if they fail to meet the conditions in the settlement agreements, which revolve around proving larger financial profits by the next review. Two of the teams—Roma and Inter—selected a four-year period for their next audit, while the remaining six opted for three-year windows. The other 19 sides that are being monitored further are in such a position because their reports only just managed to fit inside the FFP parameters. UEFA are convinced that if they hadn’t instituted more lenient measures due to COVID, then these other teams would have also been in violation. Some of these clubs still being monitored include big names such as: Manchester City, Chelsea, Barcelona, and Borussia Dortmund. In spite of the sanctions, many are still unconvinced with UEFA’s seriousness in enforcing FFP. For clubs like PSG to have the option of paying 15 percent of a €65 million FFP fine is laughable. Messi alone collects an annual salary of roughly €40 million, so a quarter of that as a fine from UEFA is hardly a deterrent for the club for future reckless spending. Of course, even when UEFA tries to escalate matters past fines to suspensions from competitions, big clubs know they can appeal the rulings with the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS), which virtually always rules to overturn the sanction. FFP has been viewed by fans with suspicion for a few years now, largely because of the lack of appropriate enforcement, and today’s news will do little to quell such opinions.
The latest FFP punishments from UEFA and Ceferin (above) seem rather tame