Athletic Club approach La Liga for ‘irregularities’ in Barcelona’s latest player registrations

After many struggles, FC Barcelona were able to finally register their new summer signing, Dani Olmo, just in time for their third La Liga clash against Rayo Vallecano later tonight.

However, the Spaniard’s registration has generated some confusion as Barcelona took advantage of Andreas Christensen’s injury-enforced absence and used his salary space to register Olmo.

While it is allowed as per Article 77 of La Liga regulations, for a club to replace a player registration in that manner, the injury has to be a long-term one i.e., at least four months out.

But Christensen’s injury was initially said to keep him out for only two months, something that his camp still insists on, leading to confusion about Olmo’s registration.

It must be noted that a team of doctors from La Liga’s medical commission – all of whom are traumatologists specialised in sports medicine – evaluated the documents sent by Barcelona and approved that Christensen’s absence could last for four months.

Athletic Club checking with La Liga

However, it appears that one of Barcelona’s La Liga rivals, Athletic Club, are not entirely convinced.

Indeed, according to journalist Alfredo Martinez, the Basque club have approached La Liga regarding any possible irregularities in the registration of not only Dani Olmo but also Inigo Martinez.

Like Olmo’s registration was done following Christensen’s injury, Barcelona registered Martinez by utilising the salary space of Araujo, who is sidelined for four months.

Barça’s relationship with Athletic Club has become strained in recent weeks, with the latter not happy with the Catalans’ public pursuit of Nico Williams during the summer.

In fact, Athletic threatened to file a complaint against Barcelona with La Liga if they triggered his release clause this summer.

More recently, the traditional pre-match lunch between the executives of the two clubs was also cancelled before the La Liga clash this past Saturday.

This latest move from the Basque outfit is bound to have more negative impact on the relationship between the two clubs.