Barcelona show restraint, only pull 2 levers!

Hello friends, welcome back to our transfer grades for big teams on the European continent. If you missed yesterday’s on Real Madrid, Atlético Madrid, AC Milan and Inter Milan, that’s right here.

We kick things off with Barcelona today, but I think the really interesting stuff is in the Bundesliga. Borussia Dortmund, Bayer Leverkusen and RB Leipzig all made pretty significant moves.

Ted’s out today, but that’s because him and Ravi were recording the podcast on Chelsea’s ownership drama, Arsenal’s injured midfield, and a hot take about player analytics being “solved.” Keep your eyes peeled for that, out Tuesday afternoon.

OK, on to Barca. —KM

Barcelona — Slightly more responsible this time

Total incomings — €65m

• Dani Olmo — €55m + €7m add-ons

• Pau Victor — €2.5m + €500k add-ons

It’s questionable whether or not Barcelona should be spending €62m on any player given their current financial situation, but Dani Olmo appears to be making the team better at the moment. There’s a pretty stark contrast in how well the ball moves around the final third and the team’s decision-making around the box when he’s in the game instead of Ferran Torres. 

But Olmo has to stay healthy to pay back that transfer fee, something he hasn’t been able to do for a long time. He’s only been fully fit about half the time for RB Leipzig the last three seasons. This move carries pretty significant risk for a team that can’t afford an injury crisis.

Barca would have loved to improve in some other areas, but decisions from previous windows made that impossible.

Ravi: A- | Kim: B+

Total outgoings — €26m

• Mikayil Faye — €10m

• Julián Araujo — €10m

• Marc Guiu — €6m

• Sergiño Dest — Free

• Marcos Alonso — Free

• Sergi Roberto — Free

• İlkay Gündoğan — Free

• 3 senior players loaned (including Vitor Roque)

Mostly good youth sales and wages freed up from poorly performing players here. But Gündoğan is the one exception — having to let him go for free just to register Olmo is rough. He probably didn’t perform up to the level Barca was expecting given his high wages, but he was still a positive contributor, and one they’d really love to have now that Marc Bernal has a torn ACL.

Ravi: B | Kim: B+

This is fine, given Barca’s current constraints. Not amazing, not terrible. But I’m looking forward to how absolutely buckwild they go once Robert Lewandowski and Frenkie de Jong’s wages come off the books.

Overall grade: B+

Borussia Dortmund — Big question marks here

Total incomings — €80m

• Maximillian Beier — €28.5m + €1.5m add-ons

• Waldemar Anton — €22.5m

• Serhou Guirassy — €17.5m

• Pascal Groß — €7m + €3m add-ons

• Yan Couto — Loan, potential €25m buy obligation

BVB have refreshed the striker department with some guys who ran super hot last year. Maximillian Beier’s 16 goals from 11.06 xG raises a few alarm bells, but it’s nothing like what Serhou Guirassy did.

This is still a good looking shot map, especially in a two-striker system where the other guy (Deniz Undav) got a lot of shots as well. But holy overperformance, Batman.

Anton has been a consistently solid Bundesliga center back, but Dortmund is paying for an age 27 breakout season. Groß might have one good year left in his legs. Couto is a super talented attacking fullback who currently provides minimal defense.

I don’t think I like any of this? There are no disasters here, this is not money down a toilet, but I don’t love any of these signings either.

Ravi: B+ | Kim: C+

Total outgoings — €42.5m

• Niclas Füllkrug — €32m

• Tom Rothe — €5m

• Paris Brunner — €4m

• Ole Pohlmann — €1.5m

• Marco Reus — Free

• Mats Hummels — Free

• 5 senior players loaned (including Sebastien Haller)

These are all very good outgoings. The Füllkrug fee was nuts, they got some money in for youngsters who weren’t good enough for their first team, and they got some huge salaries off the books.

But Dortmund’s failure to sell a lot of the guys they were shopping could limit their flexibility going forward. They were clearly angling to cash in on at least one of Karim Adeyemi, Youssoufa Moukoko, or Giovani Reyna — if not all of them — but couldn’t find buyers.

Ravi: B+ | Kim: B+

Dortmund spent quite a bit of money to probably not get meaningfully better. They should be good enough to secure a top 5 finish and qualify for Champions League, but they didn’t get closer to challenging Bayern Munich and Bayer Leverkusen for the title. They’re counting on a lot of internal improvement from young players to have a successful season.

Overall grade: B

Bayer Leverkusen — Smart!

Total incomings — €57m

• Martin Terrier — €20m + €2m add-ons

• Aleix Garcia — €18m + €2m add-ons

• Jeanuël Belocian — €15m

• Nordi Mukiele — Loan

I’m a big fan of the Aleix Garcia signing. The DM market has been a bit of a nightmare this summer, with a lot of teams simply giving up and deciding to play a youngster or convert someone who played a different position last year rather than overpay for a mediocre “true” No. 6. Getting someone who distributes this well from deep for €20m in the current market rocks.

Terrier is a pretty big gamble, but a calculated one. If he gets back to what he did in the 2021-22 campaign, then he cost Bayer one-third what he should. But he’s been injured a ton the last two seasons.

Belocian is a bit of a weird center back-left back tweener who fits a similar profile to Piero Hincapie. He makes a good understudy to the Ecuadoran, who will probably get sold to an English club for eleventy billion pounds soon.

Overall, I like this window. They got a close to sure thing midfield upgrade, a high upside prospect to back up a player they’re likely to sell soon, and placed one reasonably priced, high variance bet.

Ravi: A | Kim: A-

Total outgoings — €26.5m

• Adam Hložek — €18m

• Sardar Azmoun — €5m + €1m add-ons

• Patrick Pentz — €2.5m

• Timothy Fosu-Mensah — Free

• Odilon Kossounou — Loan

Hložek made 23 appearances in the Bundesliga last season, but 18 of them were short sub stints, and he logged just 444 minutes. His per-90 numbers were nuts in that tiny and weird sample, convincing Hoffenheim to drop €18m. Bayer have somehow made a profit on a player who was extremely disappointing for them.

I’m surprised they didn’t try to sell high on any of their back 3 or wingbacks. Especially Jonathan Tah, who is now likely to walk on a free next summer.

Ravi: B+ | Kim: B+

The buys were excellent, and the sales they made were good, but they could have stood to cash in on a couple of players who had career years last season. Given how well they’ve bought recently, I’d have backed my scouts to identify good replacements.

Overall grade: A-

RB Leipzig — Risky buys, amazing sales

Total incomings — €73m

• Antonio Nusa — €21m + €7m add-ons

• Lutsharel Geertruida — €20m + €5m add-ons

• Maarten Vandevoordt — €10m

• Assan Ouédraogo — €10m

• Arthur Vermeeren — Loan, possible €20m buy obligation

• Xavi Simons — Loan

Leipzig’s best signing might be getting Xavi Simons on loan again. Ideally you’d like to have your best players actually contracted to your club, but getting two seasons of a superstar without ever having to pay a transfer fee for him is pretty nice business.

I am a bit Nusa-skeptical after he failed to make a big leap between his age 18 and 19 seasons, but he’s still an extremely young prospect with plenty of time to develop. Stop me if you’ve heard this one before: He’s an elite athlete and dribbler who does not yet have a consistent quality end product. Sometimes those guys become Cristiano Ronaldo, sometimes they’re in MLS by age 24.

Lutsharel Geertruida is a perfect system fit for a team that sometimes plays with a back 4, and sometimes plays with a back 3 where the outside CBs are tasked with carrying the ball forward. I think he might be a bit overpriced, but Leipzig got so much money for the guy he was replacing that they probably weren’t bothered about just paying Feyenoord’s asking price to get it done. This is a good bit of scouting.

Vandevoordt has already given an interview where he said he’s surprised he wasn’t immediately the No. 1 keeper, so that’s going well. The youngsters are reasonable moves given the profit Leipzig has made this summer.

Sidenote: Wow is it sad that a club as big as Schalke now has to sell their best academy players after 1 season as pros, such is their financial predicament. Ouédraogo wouldn’t have even had a price 3 years ago.

Ravi: A | Kim: B+

Total outgoings — €113.5m

• Dani Olmo — €55m + €7m add-ons

• Mohamed Simakan — €45m

• Angeliño — €5m

• Hugo Novoa — €1.5m

• 4 senior players loaned (including Timo Werner)

Olmo rocks, but €62m for a dude who’s always injured is sensational. Simakan is a great player, but again, that’s more money than they could have reasonably hoped for. Great sales.

Ravi: A | Kim: A

Made a profit and added some high upside youngsters without getting significantly worse.

Perhaps Leipzig should have been more aggressive in going after a prime age upgrade in midfield or defense, given that they likely only have one more year of the Simons, Loïs Openda and Benjamin Šeško front three. That’s a potential Bundesliga winning attack.

Overall grade: A-

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