Be a multi-sports club. The identity that the entity has claimed for decades under the motto more than a club It has been sustained in its sections, now five professional ones—women’s soccer, basketball, handball, indoor soccer and roller hockey—which, structurally, have historically been deficient. Since 2021, these disciplines have accumulated losses close to 235.9 million, of which 65% have been concentrated in basketball.
Although income has grown and the annual deficit has been reduced by around 24 million compared to four years ago, the club has gone through the scissors. Only women’s football, with profits in the last two years, the last two million, had escaped this dynamic.
The cuts have generated traumatic departures, such as those of Mirotic or Jasikevicius in basketball, or have forced a commitment to the youth team, as in women’s football. Sports success – in 2022/23 Barça won all six leagues in all its professional sections – is increasingly difficult to sustain, mainly at the European level. “This makes it difficult for us to maintain the level,” Xavi O’Callaghan, Barça’s head of professional sports, confessed this summer. The reflection was the 24/25 season, which closed without any Champions League, an unprecedented circumstance since 2019.
The goal remains to compete and win, even amid cuts. The recent triumph of handball in the Club World Cup is an example, although with an asterisk: Nielsen, considered the best goalkeeper in the world, will not continue next season. “We feel at a disadvantage,” O’Callaghan said.
Each season, and Barça distributes that margin between registerable salary mass – players, first and second coach and physical trainer of the men’s first team – and non-registerable, which includes the rest of the staff of the first team, subsidiary, grassroots football and all sections. Last season, the club had 91 million non-registrable wage bill, with two thirds for basketball (31.5 million), women’s soccer (13.75), handball (7.5), indoor soccer (4) and roller hockey (2). For this course, according to O’Callaghan, the figure increases to 95 million, with 56 of them destined for the sections: the women’s increases by one million, and stability in the rest.
Except for basketball, which reduces its wage bill to 28.75 million. This is the historically most deficient section, despite having doubled income since 2021 and lowered sports salaries, cut by 22% compared to then. And the club has reduced the bleeding: the deficit has dropped to 20.6 million, compared to 34.68 four years ago. Without titles in the last two seasons, the fans have found oxygen with the arrival of Xavi Pascual.
The counterpoint is offered by women’s football, an oasis that is beginning to glimpse its economic ceiling. Since 2021, it has multiplied its income by five, from 4.42 to 21.69 million, and has tripled spending on salaries. However, he has not gotten rid of fair play after a summer of numerous departures and an austere transfer policy. Despite everything, it remains without rival in Spain and maintains the pulse in Europe.
The rest of the sections move in a fragile balance. Handball continues to dominate Spain, but in Europe it faces rivals with greater muscle. Its investment in salaries has fallen by 26%, from 8.81 million in 2021 to 6.49 in 2025. Roller hockey maintains its domestic hegemony and continues to compete in Europe, although it has not lifted the European Cup since 2018, and its small expenditure on salaries has been reduced by 11%. Futsal, second in the League, is in its second season outside the Champions League, and has seen its salaries cut by 26% compared to 2021.
Barça tries to preserve its multi-sport DNA in a context of financial survival. Being more than a club continues to be a source of pride; and in the current scenario, also an economic challenge.
