'Poor Barça' if opponents take charge of club, says FC Barcelona president
Joan Laporta hits back at rivals who called for his resignation and against La Liga after Dani Olmo affair
‘Us against the world’ was the note Joan Laporta wanted to strike in his press conference in which he hit back at his rivals, both within and outside the realm of FC Barcelona, since the Dani Olmo registration affair.
Buoyed by having star signing Olmo registered for the second half of the season (for now, at least) and by his side’s demolition of eternal rivals Real Madrid 2-5 in the Supercup final on Sunday night, Laporta was in the mood to take a victory lap and strike back against those he feels had taken swipes at Barcelona in the past two weeks.
"By December 31, all documentation was sent and signed," the president stated.
Barça started the new year under pressure as La Liga de-registered the club’s big-money summer signing, Dani Olmo, as they were unsatisfied that the club’s reporting of its finances matched the competition’s financial fair play criteria to have the player registered.
Olmo and Pau Víctor had both been given temporary registration in the summer, but were both eventually cleared to play for the club again after the club appealed to the Spanish government’s highest council for sports, the CSD – the Consejo Superior de Deportes – who gave a provisional (“cautelar”) ruling that would allow the players to be registered while they investigate the situation.
The de-registration had been seen as an embarrassing low point for the club, but Laporta stood before the media to offer the blaugrana’s side of the story and to offer some details of the registration affair and sales of VIP boxes in the future Camp Nou stadium.
Laporta took aim at presidential rivals who called for his resignation and at La Liga and Javier Tebas in a press conference that lasted almost two hours in the club’s facilities. “First, they take shots, and then they ask questions,” he said of the La Liga chief.
“Poor Barça,” Laporta repeated, “if the club falls into their hands,” referring to his rivals for the club presidency, who published a letter calling for him to resign and threatened a motion of no confidence.
“They’ve had a golden opportunity to show they love Barça and they didn’t take it. They sided with media hostile towards us,” Laporta said. “More and more the club is moving in the right direction. We have the 1:1 financial fair play ratio, a new stadium, a competitive team, and suddenly they appear.”
Handing in his resignation "never crossed my mind," Laporta said. "Does anybody seriously believe a president of FC Barcelona should resign over the decision of La Liga or the Spanish Football Federation?"
“I don’t know how you could oppose Barça in moments of utmost difficulty. We need patience, they tried to hinder us. We’re in a competition and they tried to destabilize us. Poor Barça if they are in charge of the club.”
“It’s no coincidence that when Barça return to the top of world football, certain parties with their corresponding media resources unite forces to impose an untruthful narrative that has nothing to do with reality,” Laporta told reporters gathered at the club’s facilities on Tuesday morning.
“They tried to destroy us, we’ve never given up.”
Olmo and Victor, Nike deal, VIP boxes
Laporta explained that on December 27, Barcelona presented documentation to La Liga which they hoped would see Olmo and Víctor registered for the second half of the season. “On the 28th, 29th, 30th, they were checking. We had complied with the budget regulations, and La Liga wanted extra requirements,” Laporta told reporters.
The club president repeated the club’s official line that he rejected La Liga’s and the Spanish Football Federation’s stances that the documentation was not correct and presented the appeal to the CSD.
Central to the registration story is also the deal agreed with Nike which Laporta repeatedly called the biggest such deal in football history, as well as the sale of VIP boxes in the future Camp Nou to Qatari investors for €100 million.
Both of these deals helped Barça to get over the line in compliance with La Liga’s financial fair play rules, therefore allowing them to register Dani Olmo and Pau Víctor. Laporta’s argument is that the club was in compliance with the rules and sent documentation on December 27, and that the league asked for other documents which delayed the process.
Laporta also described building squads with budget requirements as “complex,” and was asked about comments made in September in which he said that the club were not in the 1:1 compliance ratio (meaning that the club were not operating within the salary limits) because they “didn’t want to be” at the time.
The long-term injury to Christensen opened the door to registering Dani Olmo temporarily, buying more time to finalize the commercial contract with Nike, which ultimately needed third-party mediation to close “the biggest such contract in football history,” which “triples” the amount of money Barça were getting from the partnership. Laporta wanted to negotiate the deal for longer as he felt he could get better conditions.
Regarding the sale of future Camp Nou VIP boxes, Laporta confirmed they would “continue” to work on deals like that, and defended that “we haven’t invented this product.”
“We’re very satisfied to have created this project which didn’t exist [in Barcelona before].” The sales of VIP boxes was previously reported to have been done at a lower price than the club would have liked, given the necessity of cash to register Olmo and Víctor. Laporta defended that the deal will bring “€7 million month after month,” and confirmed the buyers will have the rights to sell the VIP boxes to third parties for their own benefit. "We have the right to increase the price of the VIP boxes, we still have ownership of the seats in market terms.”
The blaugrana chief also promised to publish an economic report on the sale of the VIP boxes.
Answering a question from a reporter, Laporta also confirmed that Barcelona remain committed to a European Super League project. “It was scheduled to come earlier but it’s delayed, but it’s there and remains alive. I reiterate that it’s for clubs to have more earnings, it’s for the stability of European football.”