You are Montserrat Giménez, chief executive of CD Benimestral, a top-division football club on Spain's Mediterranean coast. The league will not register a single new player until your squad cost fits under its limit, and three clubs have bid for your best player. The board wants your answer on him before the transfer window opens, sixteen days from now.
The situation
Monday, 15 June 2026. LaLiga's economic control department has set Benimestral's squad cost limit for 2026–27 at €58.2 million. Your squad cost, wages plus the amortisation of player registrations, is €82.1 million: €63.4 million of wages and €18.7 million of amortisation. Until you close the €23.9 million difference, no new signing can be registered. You spent years in that same department reviewing other clubs against this rule; this is the first time it binds you.
The club came back up in 2024 after eighteen years below and finished fourteenth, four points clear of relegation. In the last audited year it took in €87.3 million, 44% of it from the league's television money. Wages took 72.7% of revenue, operating profit (EBIT) was a loss of €11.1 million, net debt stands at €44.2 million and there is no free cash for the summer.
Rodrigo Fonseca, a 24-year-old Portuguese attacking midfielder, scored 12 goals and made 9 assists last season. The club paid €8 million for him in 2024; after two years of amortisation he sits in the books at €4 million. Ravensholt City has bid €42 million plus €5 million in add-ons, Olympique Valmorin €35 million and UD de Brezales €30 million. The board has tied the window to his name: €12 million for incoming players if he is sold, €2.5 million if he stays. Two fringe players could also go, each saving €1.6 million a year in wages for about €0.8 million of severance.
Your head coach, Tomasz Krawczyk, wants a quality striker and has said he will resign without one. Later this summer a vote on the stadium's name and an American offer for 20% of the club are waiting, but nothing moves until Fonseca is settled.