With "enormous losses" due to the crisis caused by the suspension of LigaPro due to the coronavirus, Liga de Quito opens up the possibility of negotiating players to avoid financial disarray.
"The budget is falling apart and when that happens, the team does not have the payment capacity for its players, suppliers, cannot pay liabilities in banks, and the planning begins to break," said executive Esteban Paz to Mundo Deportivo.
Given the lack of income from ticket sales, a category that clubs would not have for the rest of the season due to the global health reality, one option is "the sale of player contracts," Paz advanced, with the clarification that they could not be "low-cost sales" to be able to compensate for the loss of the player.
"This is the time for a planned and urgent reduction; otherwise, we could have severe problems in the economic aspect and that could reproduce issues that later affect the sports aspect," he said.
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With a budget of 20 million dollars for this season, not receiving income "causes severe problems" in the accounts of the university team.
"We have done everything possible to sustain the team and pretend to keep it as it is, we will make a greater effort because if we want to compete at a high level, we must try to maintain the team, but we have to try to find a balance in the decisions that affect the sports aspect as little as possible," commented the white executive.
During the suspension, Liga did not reduce salaries for its squad; the formula used was the retention of a part of the salaries, which has managed to keep up to date; however, "retentions are retentions, they are liabilities that are generated and must be paid at some point because contracts have not been cut."
Possible departures
Resuming negotiations for players such as center-back Franklin Guerra, midfielder Jhojan Julio, and Uruguayan forward Rodrigo Aguirre would be part of Liga's plans to overcome the crisis.
Among them, the Uruguayan is the one who complicates the alba economy the most. "We are in a severe problem because we have to continue paying very high installments to Udinese (Italy), that's why the aspiration is for him to have good exposure and we can have a viable negotiation that benefits us, that allows us to pay off the debt contracted with him, and that leaves us with a significant surplus. But if there is no play, nothing can be done, and any offer that comes will be for a lower value," Paz lamented.
Regarding Guerra and Julio, Paz said, "There has been a lot of talk but nothing is being finalized." "We hope that when international activity starts moving, we can have some offer that allows us to partially repay the debts and try to balance the ship because if we let the weight of the liabilities and debts with players sink it, it can complicate things to the point where there is no possible recovery," the executive pointed out.
In search of that balance in their finances, Paz talked about making decisions that "positively" affect the club's environment. "We know that we must lose something in the sports aspect, but we have to gain in what is most logical, which is the economic aspect in order to sustain this," he concluded. (D)