No he is leaving because they cannot register him. Barcelona doesn't have issue with paying him what he wants. Problem is Barcelona is not able to offload the players that are in thier books to decrease the wage gap. This is basically a powerplay between La Liga and Barcelona, and in a way a punishment for Barcelona's Super League ambitions.
Messi's next club: place your bets!
- Thread starter OleBoiii
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They won't be one of the favourites but winter world Cup in quatar.... wouldn't be shocked if a team outside of the perceived front runners didn't win.
Yeah Mls is a possibility as well ... could imagine him and ronaldo playing there till their 40s both trying to end up with the most goals
And many people still saying Messi is leaving because he can't get the contract he wanted.
tl;dr
Barcelona's wages WITH Messi = 110% of income
Barcelonas wages WITHOUT Messi = 95% of income
La Ligas Wage demand = Max 70% of income
Summary: Barcelona can't register Leo Messi as a player, even if he plays for free. Barcelona must still shed players or salaries before confirming new players
Solution: La Liga suspends the corona seasons fiscal income reduction to give clubs leeway to confirm new signings. As long as they are unwilling to do that, new players can't sign for Barcelona. The clubs income har nearly halved in a unprecedented season, which La Liga is laying as the foundation for it's Financial Fair Play formula for this upcoming season. I'm a little puzzled why this isn't someting that's been considered, but theres probably uncertainty about the upcoming season and if clubs can sustain another year with no fans in the ground, which is why they're taking such a hard line. The 10% equity sale of La Liga does not affect the FFP.
Barcelona's wages WITH Messi = 110% of income
Barcelonas wages WITHOUT Messi = 95% of income
La Ligas Wage demand = Max 70% of income
Summary: Barcelona can't register Leo Messi as a player, even if he plays for free. Barcelona must still shed players or salaries before confirming new players
Solution: La Liga suspends the corona seasons fiscal income reduction to give clubs leeway to confirm new signings. As long as they are unwilling to do that, new players can't sign for Barcelona. The clubs income har nearly halved in a unprecedented season, which La Liga is laying as the foundation for it's Financial Fair Play formula for this upcoming season. I'm a little puzzled why this isn't someting that's been considered, but theres probably uncertainty about the upcoming season and if clubs can sustain another year with no fans in the ground, which is why they're taking such a hard line. The 10% equity sale of La Liga does not affect the FFP.
He tried to leave a year ago and let his contract run down. I'm sorry but this blaming La Liga is just some stupid spin. He obviously wanted out of the club. It doesn't matter about Barca not being able to register him, he has engineered the situation where he can just leave for free.
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You’re on drugs, Messi didn’t engineer anything. He wanted to stay this season and wanted re-sign, last year he wanted to leave. Two completely opposite reasons.
Ronaldo is in Barcelona today, gonna play today at the Camp Nou. I'm wishing him and Messi secretly meet and Messi goes to Juventus in an incredible plot twist. 
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...and then bizarrely let his contract run down despite wanting to stay. Weird. And by all reports has a contract basically agreed with PSG within days, his agent must move fast.
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you are clueless. Barca had no president and no signings were allowed to be made when Barto was forced out. Messi had no choice but to let his contract run down. Then they had to figure out the financial
aspect of how to make it work and got blindsided with a bomb the other day. The season starts next week of course they will move fast to find him a new team. Use your head
Because he hadn't played in the top two divisions until he was post 30. Messi obviously has.
But nothing he did at United changed anything anyway. Everyone's mind was made up before then.
And what was he doing at 34? Was anybody asking him to prove himself?
When Gullit moved to Chelsea did everyone think "now we'll see what he's really about?"
What happens now is completely irrelevant to however you view Messi. His status, whatever you think that is, was decided ages ago. As it was with Ronaldo, Scholes or whoever.
People have made up their opinions and will not agree with anything opposite it seems
They're using the salary cap as a excuse so both the club and Messi can end the relation without appearing in a bad light for doing so, he can come out crying and I'm sure he is genuinely sad about leaving the club but this is about money and Barcelona are in a bad situation. They offered him 30 million a year then told his father it wasn't enough and they could give him 20 million a year and that's when the negotiations ended. He's getting twice as what Barcelona was offering and while Barcelona is the most affected part they can now start cleaning up their mess.
Completely untrue. If Messi wanted to play for just a euro, it wouldn’t be able to be done.
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There was no offer Barca could give him where he could play, even if Messi said he would play for a million euro a season. Poor financial is what screwed up Barca, and Messi was completely blindsided as both sides had an agreement in place until
Laporta changed his mind at the last minute because of the CVC contract.
Any source for this?
They could work something out like they're goind to do with Agüero and depay. In the bigger context sure they can't pay him 40 million a year, and they should cut expenses as much as they can but his father wasn't happy with the 20 million offer so in the end it's the best for both parties to end the relation right now; Messi has better offers and the club needs to solve their financial issues and cut as much expenses as they can.
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You can take it as you want but so far I think they've been accurate with what has been going on and how things have unfolded, at least is sounds way more believable than people saying there was no way Barcelona could work a way for Messi to keep playing there.
I'm not saying he should accept to lower his salary in 70% or that it is in Barcelona's best interests to retain him with their massive finantial issues but it is what it is. Barcelona can't pay him as much as PSG and the negotiations ended with that offer.
Maybe his father is right and Laporta was using Messi, but he came out saying he was assured La Liga would let them offer Messi a contract where they would differ his wages over 5 years but in the last minute they wouldn't allow the club to make such contract.
and Laporta did well to reject the blackmail of Tebas. In any case, almost a year has passed since the burofax.
Jorge Messi arrives in Barcelona and is suddenly told that the offer is even lower. Doesn't it seem a bit improvised for someone who manage the Messi clan, who have known the club for twenty years, who speak with executives, the press, his own lawyers, to find out what the real situation is?
Don't you think that Messi has tightened the rope a lot? ( always keeping in mind that he is a player of la Masía, not a recently arrived player)
When talking about Messi´s contract I read the "he is willing to accept a salary cut", as if the starting point was the contract he signed when he was 30 years old (In the contract proposals that appeared in the press, there was always talk of 75 net, spread over several years) , as if this were an extension of one year and not a new contract according to his age.
In the whole year there was no way to find a way to renew? ,because no one talked about the salary cap until two weeks ago
Laporta said all Season long (and based his entire election) on re-signing Messi. It is absolutely fishy as hell that all season he tells everyone (including Messi) that a deal will be down. He even booked a restaurant to celebrate the contract signing. Messi comes into the office to sign a contract and then gets blindsided by Laporta. Laporta strung everyone along and then backed out at the very last minute. They “thought” they were just 200 million in debt but decided not to do a proper audit until a week ago? (Which showed losses of 487 million last year alone).
Laporta should have been much more upfront with Messi and the fans. He had all season to work on this and has done a piss Poor job of selling players. I understand most clubs don’t want our deadwood but the fact that outside of potentially pjanic and Firpo he has done very poor despite all those “promises”
but I keep forgetting he’s just a politician. Barto set the bar so low that Laporta will obviously be better but he handled this Messi situation extremely poorly
The audit a week ago made things very complicated, but it was already known that the situation was very bad.
As you say he had the whole season to work on it, but as I told you until recently they were considering 75 net contracts, so I speculate that those were their demands.
They say that when Ramos met with Florentino to rush him with his contract, he told him that PSG was preparing a great team with him and Messi.
In short, have you considered that this is all a show and that everything has been agreed a long time ago and as some poster said previously, the two use la liga to justify themselves
It could be a show from Laporta, as a matter of fact I’m certain that it is, but Messi was absolutely left in the dark. No doubt about that. Aguero definitely wouldn’t have signed if he knew Messi was headed to PSG. Laporta should have been more honest with Messi months ago
Disappointed for what?Who's askingjust like nobody 'asked' Maradona to prove himself at Napoli, or Ronaldo at 34 to Serie A... they just do. People are just disappointed with Messi. Ligue 1 UberEats. Thought you guys still regarded him as best in the world ?
What exactly a 6 times Balloon D'or winner has to prove scoring every weekend against the likes of Arsenal, Leicester,Everton,Westbrom,Wolves,etc....
That he is as good as non-ballon D'or winners Harry Kane or Agüero who have scored for fun in the EPL? Or that he is as good as Lukaku( who scored tons of goals when playing for Everton)?
In the great scheme of things I think Laporta is doing what is best for Barcelona, although Barcelona is the most affected part by his departure. Messi is at the dawn of his career, still massive player so he's going to get paid appropriately in his next club Barcelona probably won't do so hot without him but hopefully this will help them to resolve the mess they're in.
The club needs to cut their wages by a lot, if Messi's gone then I think the rest of the players will get the message in the sense that they're serious and will get rid of them if necessary. I do believe the club could had done something to meet Messi's demands by selling their most valuable players, like Pedri or de jong, but that wouldn't be in Barcelona's best interest; so I do think that despite of being a hard choice he has done what's best for Barcelona long term in order to put the finances in order.
Then I agree with you he could, and should, had done something about selling someone out of Coutinho, Griezmann or dembele. I don't know who you rate more but I think it's necesary the club sells someone of their most overpaid players (I would sell Coutinho).
I don't really believe that information from Chirinquito. In fact, Messi himself said that they had only talked about reducing to 50% and that's it. Which, apparently, would be the maximum to be reduced according to La Liga rules if there was a previous contract. So he couldn't play for free or even for 1 euro either.
Messi has made his life in Barcelona together with his family, and seeing his behavior, I doubt that he is simply leaving because they do not pay him what he wants.
But that's it, now it remains to be seen how they resolve the issue of the wage bill, they continue, without Messi, being 25% above the maximum allowed.
Messi has made his life in Barcelona together with his family, and seeing his behavior, I doubt that he is simply leaving because they do not pay him what he wants.
But that's it, now it remains to be seen how they resolve the issue of the wage bill, they continue, without Messi, being 25% above the maximum allowed.
The only truth in all this drama is that Messi agreed to the maximum reduction in salary allowed by Spanish law ie 50% and they did not ask anything more from him.
As for playing for free, that only exists in fantasy land. At the end of the day, in any job, renumeration is part of motivation. I'm sure no one would except a wage reduction let alone working for free.
I agree with you there that it’s definitely not worth selling pedri or de Jong for just two more years of Messi. But it’s crazy how hard it is to get rid of dembele and coutinho. Shocked Juve are even considering Pjanic again. But then again they are another poorly managed club.
long term maybe it was best to let Messi go, the finances are a huge disaster. I just feel like Laporta pulled the rug from under Messi and considering how much he claims keeping Messi would be top priority it feels a bit back handed.
It was handled so poorly. It is what it is.
Naah he likes River Plate a lot more. He even apologized when he scored against them in the Clubs WC.
If I was Messi, I’d have done a mini tour of Europe to win as many different titles as possible. Start off with 12 months at City, then probably Juventus for a year, save Bayern until last as that’s a guaranteed title.
https://www.sport.es/es/noticias/barca/salida-messi-costarle-137-millones-11978592
Messi´s exit can cost 137 million to Barcelona FC
Messi´s exit can cost 137 million to Barcelona FC
A stat-padding tour for future GOAT debates, basically
how much more do they need to reduce the wage bill ? which players need to go to balance the books ?
I think there are a lot of extremes suggested here and a lot of conspiracy theories.
I don't think Messi was kept in the dark, and I don't think there was a bomb with the audit that took everyone by surprise. Let's be realistic here, we're talking about a huge club and the richest player on the planet.
I think the truth is somewhere in the middle. Laporta took over and his administration got to work. After they had time to analyze the financial ruin with full access, they realized just how bad it was and obviously at that point they'd have known what it would take to keep Messi, and I think they told Messi's entourage. There's no reason not to, for the following reasons: 1. Messi would have to be told why he's supposed to halve his wage and 2. imagine the fallout if they keep it a secret, the renewal doesn't happen and Messi blasts Laporta's administration for leading him on. It just isn't reasonable that Messi wouldn't be told what the situation was.
This is where two very logical things start to happen - on one side, Barça tries to offload deadweight, and on the other side Messi's entourage begins engineering a move to a different club, knowing that Barça likely won't succeed in moving said deadweight. Barça kept players in the shopping window the entire Summer and you could see that we were moving from one player to another. Umtiti, Coutinho, Dembele, Griezmann, Alba... names were leaked one by one as the club was trying to put pressure on the players to leave. Unsurprisingly, no one wanted to leave because they were on fat contracts that couldn't be replicated at clubs not run by incompetent criminals like Bartomeu. So, we couldn't move any players because they were too comfortable with their contracts and more than willing to force Barça into paying them until their contracts run down. These players were first and foremost thinking about their own bottom line, not about Messi's wishes or Barça's priorities. This was expected, and in the end we spent most of the Summer and the entire EURO unable to move anyone on. I think our hopes ended with Dembele's injury and it became clear we wouldn't be able to make the money necessary to finance Messi's new deal.
During this time, Messi prepared for the likely outcome that people like Sergi Roberto, Coutinho, Umtiti etc. would be too comfortable to leave and he wouldn't be able to have his contract registered, even with a 50% wage cut, which is the most he could accept under Spanish law. I mean, why is there a conspiracy theory here? If you told me all these details before the Summer started, I would have lost all hope of retaining Messi. As soon as Bartomeu gave deadweight players huge wages, this was done. Slow train coming.
So, I don't think Laporta or Messi were taken by surprise. They knew what was happening and I do believe the Club tried to shift dead wood, while Messi held out hope, but I think ultimately both expected this outcome as it could only have been avoided if the Club somehow managed to sell nearly useless players for a lot of money. It didn't happen, the time to join pre-season came and the Club and Messi decided to come out with the "news" in order for Messi to have enough time to sign the deal with his new club, as the Ligue 1 already started. So, no conspiracy really, they just ran out of time and options and couldn't wait anymore.
There is a difference between all of this being pre-arranged months ago, and being planned for months ago. Difference being whether an outcome was a contingecy or the only course of action. The reason I don't think it was pre-arranged is the fact Barça signed Kun. That wasn't an obvious transfer and now we have problems registering the player. That should tell you it wasn't pre-arranged because if it was, it would mean Messi allowed Kun to join Barça thinking he'd play with Messi, all the while Messi knowing it would never happen. That's far-fetched as Kun could have joined any other club and Messi could have just told him in private not to sign for Barça because of him as he'd be gone.
About Laporta, he is certainly capable of making a show and he's a politician, so it is not above (or beneath) him to campaign on Messi's renewal, to then bin that option while still acting like there's a lot of effort to make it all happen like he promised. So no, I'm not oblivious to Joan Laporta, I just don't see the interest for him to ditch Messi. Certainly it is beneficial for Barça to keep Messi instead of Coutinho, Dembele, Umtiti etc. This is simple common sense, like you'd prefer to eat a sandwich instead of a turd, so I think he tried but couldn't make it happen, because you know, math and contracts and all that.
This is already long. To conclude, I think Messi wanted to stay but couldn't. I think Laporta tried to keep him but couldn't. Barça wanted to get rid of deadweight but couldn't. Ask yourself this: if you were a useless player like Umtiti, would you accept a contract with a smaller club for one-fifth of your Barça wage? If you were Laporta, would you be able to find a way to force a player to ditch his fat contract? If the answer to both those questions is no, then you don't need a conspiracy to explain what happened here, it's just individual interests that combined in a way that has us screwed.
About Messi's departure, I knew it was coming, I'm just sad it happened this way. I hoped Messi would be able to say "This is my last season" and we'd be able to actually honor and appreciate that fact. I hoped to be able to watch his last Clasico, knowing it was his last. I hoped to be able to watch his last Camp Nou game, knowing it was his goodbye. My sister now lives in Barcelona so I held out hope that we'd be able to hang onto Leo for one more season so I could have a season's worth of time to plan out a trip after 'rona to see him one more time in a Barça shirt. I saw him live once, I hoped to be able to do it for a second time in our shirt, but now that won't happen. I feel like after everything Messi's given me and my family and all the joy we had watching him, the proper way to pay homage would be to see him live once more. Now I'm going to have to go to Paris to say my goodbye. FFS.
I hope Messi wins the Champions League with PSG. He's going to enjoy it there, as he should.
God damn it.
I don't think Messi was kept in the dark, and I don't think there was a bomb with the audit that took everyone by surprise. Let's be realistic here, we're talking about a huge club and the richest player on the planet.
I think the truth is somewhere in the middle. Laporta took over and his administration got to work. After they had time to analyze the financial ruin with full access, they realized just how bad it was and obviously at that point they'd have known what it would take to keep Messi, and I think they told Messi's entourage. There's no reason not to, for the following reasons: 1. Messi would have to be told why he's supposed to halve his wage and 2. imagine the fallout if they keep it a secret, the renewal doesn't happen and Messi blasts Laporta's administration for leading him on. It just isn't reasonable that Messi wouldn't be told what the situation was.
This is where two very logical things start to happen - on one side, Barça tries to offload deadweight, and on the other side Messi's entourage begins engineering a move to a different club, knowing that Barça likely won't succeed in moving said deadweight. Barça kept players in the shopping window the entire Summer and you could see that we were moving from one player to another. Umtiti, Coutinho, Dembele, Griezmann, Alba... names were leaked one by one as the club was trying to put pressure on the players to leave. Unsurprisingly, no one wanted to leave because they were on fat contracts that couldn't be replicated at clubs not run by incompetent criminals like Bartomeu. So, we couldn't move any players because they were too comfortable with their contracts and more than willing to force Barça into paying them until their contracts run down. These players were first and foremost thinking about their own bottom line, not about Messi's wishes or Barça's priorities. This was expected, and in the end we spent most of the Summer and the entire EURO unable to move anyone on. I think our hopes ended with Dembele's injury and it became clear we wouldn't be able to make the money necessary to finance Messi's new deal.
During this time, Messi prepared for the likely outcome that people like Sergi Roberto, Coutinho, Umtiti etc. would be too comfortable to leave and he wouldn't be able to have his contract registered, even with a 50% wage cut, which is the most he could accept under Spanish law. I mean, why is there a conspiracy theory here? If you told me all these details before the Summer started, I would have lost all hope of retaining Messi. As soon as Bartomeu gave deadweight players huge wages, this was done. Slow train coming.
So, I don't think Laporta or Messi were taken by surprise. They knew what was happening and I do believe the Club tried to shift dead wood, while Messi held out hope, but I think ultimately both expected this outcome as it could only have been avoided if the Club somehow managed to sell nearly useless players for a lot of money. It didn't happen, the time to join pre-season came and the Club and Messi decided to come out with the "news" in order for Messi to have enough time to sign the deal with his new club, as the Ligue 1 already started. So, no conspiracy really, they just ran out of time and options and couldn't wait anymore.
There is a difference between all of this being pre-arranged months ago, and being planned for months ago. Difference being whether an outcome was a contingecy or the only course of action. The reason I don't think it was pre-arranged is the fact Barça signed Kun. That wasn't an obvious transfer and now we have problems registering the player. That should tell you it wasn't pre-arranged because if it was, it would mean Messi allowed Kun to join Barça thinking he'd play with Messi, all the while Messi knowing it would never happen. That's far-fetched as Kun could have joined any other club and Messi could have just told him in private not to sign for Barça because of him as he'd be gone.
About Laporta, he is certainly capable of making a show and he's a politician, so it is not above (or beneath) him to campaign on Messi's renewal, to then bin that option while still acting like there's a lot of effort to make it all happen like he promised. So no, I'm not oblivious to Joan Laporta, I just don't see the interest for him to ditch Messi. Certainly it is beneficial for Barça to keep Messi instead of Coutinho, Dembele, Umtiti etc. This is simple common sense, like you'd prefer to eat a sandwich instead of a turd, so I think he tried but couldn't make it happen, because you know, math and contracts and all that.
This is already long. To conclude, I think Messi wanted to stay but couldn't. I think Laporta tried to keep him but couldn't. Barça wanted to get rid of deadweight but couldn't. Ask yourself this: if you were a useless player like Umtiti, would you accept a contract with a smaller club for one-fifth of your Barça wage? If you were Laporta, would you be able to find a way to force a player to ditch his fat contract? If the answer to both those questions is no, then you don't need a conspiracy to explain what happened here, it's just individual interests that combined in a way that has us screwed.
About Messi's departure, I knew it was coming, I'm just sad it happened this way. I hoped Messi would be able to say "This is my last season" and we'd be able to actually honor and appreciate that fact. I hoped to be able to watch his last Clasico, knowing it was his last. I hoped to be able to watch his last Camp Nou game, knowing it was his goodbye. My sister now lives in Barcelona so I held out hope that we'd be able to hang onto Leo for one more season so I could have a season's worth of time to plan out a trip after 'rona to see him one more time in a Barça shirt. I saw him live once, I hoped to be able to do it for a second time in our shirt, but now that won't happen. I feel like after everything Messi's given me and my family and all the joy we had watching him, the proper way to pay homage would be to see him live once more. Now I'm going to have to go to Paris to say my goodbye. FFS.
I hope Messi wins the Champions League with PSG. He's going to enjoy it there, as he should.
God damn it.
I don't buy that part because his contract is over, isn't it? It would be a new contract altogether, anyway what is true is that Barcelona cannot match what PSG offers and Laporta did claim he tried to do the thing where he gives him a 5 year contract to spread his salary of two years but wasn't allowed to do such thing. Then now Tebas acussed him on having being on board with the CVC deal, so it's a shit show with the league right now but maybe he indeed was on board with said arrangement but decided it was not the best for the club even if it meant not bein able to offer Messi a new contract.
I don't know. What I can assume is that it makes no difference because the rules aren't made to be easy to bypass. If Messi runs down his contract, then a couple of days later signs a new one which is supposed to be completely unconnected to the previous one, that's a mockery and it's not the way laws work. I don't know anything about Spanish labour law, I graduted from law school but not in Spain so this is speculation, but from what I know this wouldn't work. Doesn't this seem too simple of a solution to you? Barça wouldn't have thought of this?
About the CVC deal, I didn't reference this in my post because I think it's a non-issue. It was supposed to trick Barça into a multi-decade deal just to keep Messi for two years. Something like that can't be seriously considered an option, it was a trap to end the Super League and Laporta had no business assuming obligations for decades just because we're in a bind. I don't consider the CVC deal a real chance to keep Messi. It was if you disregard everything else that matters.
At the end that's what happened, for the last week people have been baffled with the Barcelona situation and make fun of the proposal of giving Messi an artificial 5 year contract in order to spread his wages and make it seem like a cut. They need to cut wages and La Liga is making sure they do so not really disagreeing with you on what is a likely assumption on how things went down.
There's no "matching what PSG offers", most news report that Messi's contrat at PSG will pretty be the same he agreed on with Barcelona. Barcelona was just unable to find a way to make it happen. Nothing indicates that there was a competition with PSG, we are just a plan B.
On top of that, as i mentionned yesterday, the reports about a statutory 50% max paycut between 2 contract is heavily disputed. I've shared a tweet about it were some people quote someone they describe as a spanish sports finance expert who says it doesn't apply to la liga contracts.
Him going to PSG is going to make them a weird team.
Offensively monstrous, but defensively, they'll be 3 men short every time.
Given how offensive their wing backs are gonna be, they'll be a very open side to hit on a counter.
Lots of teams will have free reign on the ball as well, given that front 3 would not believe in pressing.
Offensively monstrous, but defensively, they'll be 3 men short every time.
Given how offensive their wing backs are gonna be, they'll be a very open side to hit on a counter.
Lots of teams will have free reign on the ball as well, given that front 3 would not believe in pressing.
That's a fair assessment and one of my biggest concerns, we might turn into a glorified counter attack team to avoid huge gaps. Having 3 center backs with Marquinhos in an hybrid role of CB/6 might also be an option since he can cover a lot of space.
Laporta had to choose between keeping Messi which required agreeing with CVC investment versus going ahead with the superleague. Initially, he had sided with the CVC investment to keep Messi but after meeting Perez, he changed his mind hence Messi's sudden departure despite the later agreeing to the maximum possible wage reduction allowed in Spain.
So when Laporta says he cannot sacrifice the future of the club for Messi, he means he can't sacrifice the super league and sign up to an investment that will over the long term eat into a portion of the clubs revenues.
Reminds me of Enrique's Barcelona. Only definitely their centre backs will be better than Pique who is an overrated tortoise.
Could do worse although prime Suarez is better than Mbappe currently for me. Pique was great at one time - he’s been average for a few years now though.