Monaco: Salary Delays Accumulate and Weaken the Roca Team
AS Monaco is coming off a two-faced week, but one that is particularly revealing of deep difficulties. After an impressive series of 11 consecutive victories across all competitions, the team led by Vassilis Spanoulis saw its momentum brutally crack.
Defeated at home by Red Star Belgrade last Tuesday in a game that was theirs for the taking, the Roca Team then experienced a nightmarish evening two days later on Real Madrid’s court. A match marked by what the Greek coach himself described as « the worst first half of the season. » The comfortable victory in Saint-Quentin on Sunday (73-98) closed out a week more complicated than the previous ones.
An Increasingly Worrying Financial Situation
Beyond sports performance, it is the economic situation of the Principality’s club that is concerning. Still mired in difficulties accessing its own liquidity, president Aleksej Fedorycsev is seeking alternative solutions to keep afloat a club with a cost of living supposedly the highest in French basketball.
But even the EuroLeague has added weight to an already tense context. The competition imposed a record fine of 300,000 euros on AS Monaco, along with a ban on registering new players. A severe sanction with significant consequences, while the club was counting on strengthening its roster, particularly in the paint, to relieve an interior sector that has been struggling for several weeks.
The Cory Joseph Case and a Tarnished Image
This sanction also precipitated the end of the Cory Joseph (1.88 m, 34 years old) case, who finally left to join rival club Olympiakos. A departure that only accentuated the weakening of the image of a club now under threat of exclusion from the Betclic ELITE playoffs by the LNB in case of non-payment of amounts owed, particularly regarding the Luxury Tax.
Players at Their Limit, Salaries in Arrears
But the breaking point is probably located within the locker room itself. The players, increasingly distrustful of management, are seeing their salaries arrive with increasingly significant delays. To the point that a strike threat loomed before the home game against Gravelines-Dunkerque, ultimately won 101-82 on Tuesday, January 13, 2026, while certain members of the roster had still not received their November salary.
Faced with this situation, the club proceeded to pay November in full for some of the players, via accounts external to those of the club. However, the four highest salaries on the roster are still waiting for part of their compensation for the same month.
An Accumulation of Debts Difficult to Sustain
As of January 27, December 2025 salaries have still not been paid, while January salaries will be due in the coming days. An accumulation that adds to dozens of unpaid service provider invoices, not to mention agent commissions still unpaid for the 2024-2025 season, and even more so for the current year.
In this context, AS Monaco’s situation appears a little more difficult to sustain each day. And in the short term, nothing suggests that the horizon will clear for the Roca Team.
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