‘Espai Barça’: how to go from 600 to 1,500 million

It should not be easy for the board of directors of a club to convince its members to give it permission to request a loan of 1,500 million euros, especially when this amount is not intended to pay a debt of 1,350 million after suffering losses of 481 million.

Nor will it be easy for the partner in question to vote and be able to discriminate between the old and the new rectors and give credibility to the remodeling of that project that it claims. an investment (maximum) of those 1,500 million when the one who voted enthusiastically (72.36%) in 2014 was 600 million, corrected and increased in 2020 to 815 million.

“Fundamental” project

The Barça space it is “absolutely fundamental for the viability of Barça in the short, medium and long term.” A colossal work such as this very important and historical project, as presented by the president Josep Maria Bartomeu -Remember: remodeling of the Camp Nou, construction of a new Palau Blaugrana, a small pavilion, an ice rink, the Johan Cruyff stadium and three buildings, two for offices and a hotel- and so expensive (more than double what it declared seven years ago) also deserves capital adjectives such as “fundamental”.

Before the Assembly of Committees next Sunday he will defend the project and ask for a vote of confidence Maria Elena Fort (born in Barcelona in 1970, member 8,297), the institutional vice-president of the Joan Laporta board, lawyer, former deputy to Parliament and specialist in urban issues.

The need to build the Barça space it is basically inexpensive. The increase in income that the expansion of the facilities and their daily use will bring about is one of the pillars on which the recovery of the entity and its ability to compete with its rivals as equals will be based. Or almost. A capacity that has been lost with the evolution of football.

Serious pathologies

“We cannot compete with the clubs that have a state behind by injecting money, nor with those that have a billionaire behind them nor with those that are run by companies that can resort to capital increases,” explains Fort, adding another reason to promote the remodeling of the Camp Nou: the desire to have “a decent stadium for our subscribers”.

It is not entirely at the moment, after 900 pathologies were discovered at the Camp Nou, more than a hundred serious with risk to the safety of the spectators, as explained by Ferran Reverter, the new general director and that Bartomeu’s board ignored despite know them. “We cannot stay with a 20th century stadium,” concludes the directive.

The constructive arrangements were not practiced, perhaps due to the lack of money, spent on other tasks, not all of them explainable. That money is still lacking.

Untold markers

“The situation is so serious that when we entered the question was not whether we could spend more or less or how to cut expenses, but to save the club. We have taken him out of the hole, but he is still in the UVI”, describes Fort graphically, so graphically, how he tries to explain the conversion of a 600 million project into a 1,500 million one in seven years or how 122 million have already been spent (25% of the original price) and only 5% of the work has been completed.

“The 2014 project with a cost of 600 million it was virtual, it was fake and it was a hoax, “he replies. It was designed with grossly undervalued costs aimed at obtaining approval in the referendum, he argues.

Threat in the first tier

The plan, presented by Bartomeu, but developed from Sandro Rosell’s original board, was intended to be a paragon of austerity that would support the liability action filed against the Laporta board. Fort was one of the victims. «We have adjusted the cost to the real price. For example, the bookmarks were not counted », he points out. The subscribers of the first covered grandstand (about 12,000) were also not informed that they would be transferred to the third because the luxury boxes would be located in their place. Now they will not be moved en masse.

Reality, regardless of which eyes you look at it, reveals that the cost of a stadium is close to a billion euros. Wembley, in 2007, surpassed that figure. Tottenham Hotspur’s has climbed to 1,200 million. The Allianz Arena in Munich or the Metropolitano in Madrid have not exceeded 400 million, on the contrary. Reverter estimated that the reform of the Camp Nou will range between 800 and 900 million. The Palau Blaugrana, however, is not worth 90 million, according to the original appraisal, but from 300 to 400 million. None have the capacity of the 105,000 spectators that will fit in the Barcelona venue.

Seven years later and 119 million spent (23 million more are committed), the execution of the Space Barça consists of the construction of the Johan Cruyff Stadium (budgeted at 4 million, paid 19 million), the demolition of the Miniestadi, the renovation of the Camp Nou electrical installation and the urbanization of the surroundings of the Barça facilities. There are more than 40 people working on the club’s payroll and several companies dedicated to Espai Barça, a human and economic volume that will be reviewed in the internal investigation (the second) undertaken by Laporta.

Confidence vote

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The president will have to overcome the suspicions that the Barça partners may harbor despite the fact that they should not scratch their pockets. The permission that will be asked of them is, also, a vote of confidence towards the board, as rational as it could be the vote they gave him in the March 7 elections.

The financing that will be requested (from Goldman Sachs, presumably), will not affect ordinary activity. It is a parallel account that will begin to be paid from the expected income plus. In the best of cases, the Camp Nou will open in 2025. The Palau has no date. “The Barça space it does not endanger the viability of the club or the form of ownership or decision-making », says Fort, trying to eliminate the reluctance of the members:” If you do not move, you are dead and we cannot back down, so only you can move forward by looking forward. ” Looking to Sunday, first, and to the future later.