Barcelona are broke and needed emergency loan to pay wages in June

Barcelona football club have had to take out an emergency €150m loan to keep the club liquid after failing to pay players and staff at the end of June.

New club president Sandro Rosell acknowledged that the club has liquidity problems and needed the loan to pay players.

(see BBC sport report)

This tells you everything you need to know about Barcelona football club and their approach over the last decade of buying stars to compete with Real Madrid. It's succeeded on the pitch but at what cost?

Despite carving up the Spanish TV market in combination with the Madridsta's and thus condemning the other 16 members of the Spanish Primera to long-term mediocrity, the Catalan club is broke.

We may be seeing the start of a collapse in the established order in Spain, and perhaps elsewhere in Europe if UEFA get their way and have financial checks before allowing teams to compete in the Champions League and/or Europa League.