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A pandemic changes everything. FC Barcelona is now ready to assign a sponsor name to the Camp Nou for the next decades. Last month, Barça said its goal was to sell the title rights to Europe’s largest stadium for next season, to raise money for the global fight against the coronavirus. But Jordi Cardoner i Casaus, the club’s first vice president, told ESPN that Barça is open to a much longer naming deal with a sponsor.
“This is something I could add to this year’s deal: 25 more years,” says Cardoner. “The first year for the coronavirus and the following 25 for commercial reasons, having the title rights of the Camp Nou. Why not?”
In a powerful conversation, Cardoner provided a rare insight into the struggles of a giant club during the closing of soccer. He discussed issues including the player salary cut, smaller than most people think, this summer’s transfer market, the date soccer could resume and the amount of Barça’s debt (around 460 million euros). The virus appears to have worsened the club’s internal turmoil, with Lionel Messi speaking against the board and six other directors resigning in April amid allegations that the club hired I3 Ventures to campaign on social media against the Barça’s own players. (The club says I3 was only monitoring social media.)
Barcelona President Josep Maria Bartomeu, Cardoner’s schoolmate from age 6 and up, is under pressure, but the coronavirus now dwarfs everything at the club. Speaking from home via Whatsapp, Cardoner has just recovered from the virus. So far, he has killed more than 10,000 people in the club’s native region of Catalonia, according to funeral data. Barça called the pandemic “the biggest health, economic and social crisis in modern history” and declared its duty to help combat it.
Cardoner has been a Barça man since his grandfather, Nicolas Casaus (himself the club’s first vice president), signed him up as partner (member) immediately after birth. Speaking of the coronavirus response, Cardoner cites Barça’s catchphrase, “More than a club.” (“More than a club”). No doubt he is serious too. Barça has donated masks and protective clothing to health services, while partners Around Catalonia they have participated in the management of food banks. However, fighting the virus will also help Barça repair a tattered image by internal rules, as well as provide coverage to change the name of the Camp Nou.
A drop in Barça’s income
The virus has devastated the club’s finances. In the 2017-18 season, Barça became the first club in any sport to reach $ 1 billion in annual revenue. At the end of February, Cardoner says, “We were over budget, it was a very successful position, looking forward to a beautiful end of the year.” Then soccer closed. “We cut our income extremely far,” he admits.
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Barça has lost around 50 million euros in ticket sales and its museum, 39 million euros in television income and between 20 and 25 million euros in commercial income from its stores, soccer schools, “activities of legends “, etc. The total impact on revenue is already between 120 and 140 million euros, he says.
“This is for sure, what we know today. These millions will be in our losses by the end of the year.” The club is sure to lose this year, he adds. The expense will have to fall.
Salary reduction for players
Barça players have agreed to a 72% pay cut, after teleconferences between Bartomeu and the captains of the Messi team, Sergio Busquets, Gerard Piqué and Sergi Roberto. Cardoner notes that the pay cut only applies from the start of the lockout in March to the end of the season, so seen throughout the year, players will only lose between 8-11% of their wages. Still, this will be enough to allow all of the roughly 500 non-Barca employees to keep their full wages.
After the agreement was agreed, Messi took the opportunity to the club officials from his Instagram account: “We want to clarify that our desire has always been for a reduction to be applied to our wages because we understand that this is an exceptional situation and we are the first ones who have ALWAYS helped the club with what they have asked us … we are surprised that from within the club there are people who want to put us under a magnifying glass or try to pressure us so that we are always something clear that we wanted to do. “
Cardoner’s response is diplomatic. “The players have been very positive. They understood the situation from the beginning. They are ready to make this effort because they know that this situation is not a joke.”
Soccer may not restart soon
Speaking days before the announcement that La Liga expected to restart in June, Cardoner is cautious about the chances of completing this season. “Every day we have new contributions. We want to be safe, take care of our players and their health. This is priority number one, but also number two and three. We will not take risks. We want that to return the competition is in the best form If not, we are not ready to continue. We are talking about people, their lives, their families. “
Would the Spanish league be ready to restart in September?
“This is my point of view: it will be very difficult,” he replies. One possible scenario is that after a period of closed-door soccer, “The League can start with the public no earlier than February 2021.” Once some viewers can be admitted, Barça’s 85,000 season ticket holders “will have greater rights than outsiders,” he says.
Player changes instead of transfer fees
He predicts that with clubs now fighting for cash, exchanging players without changing hands will be common practice in the transfer market this summer. “This is how things will happen for next season at European clubs,” he says.
He suggested that, in some cases, three clubs could agree on a single interconnected agreement, with one player going from Club A to Club B, another from Club B to Club C, and a third from Club C to Club A.
Dan Thomas joins Craig Burley, Shaka Hislop, and a host of other guests every day as soccer traces a path through the coronavirus crisis. Stream on ESPN + (US only).
Debt of 460-470 million euros.
Barça expects lower income next season, with fewer ticket sales and museum visitors. Cardoner says: “We are preparing the budget for next season and we will adapt our income to our expenses.”
He also says that the club’s debt is around 460-470 million euros. The clubs report their debts using different criteria, but the UEFA benchmarking report released in January named only two clubs (Manchester United and Spurs) with the highest net debts. (For some reason, UEFA’s list of the 20 most indebted clubs in Europe does not include Barça.)
That said, Cardoner insists that the club’s debt is manageable. He points out that it only represents approximately half of the annual income, while a decade ago the debt was almost equal to the income, at about 400 million euros.
“A lot of people wonder if our club will suffer to reduce the excellence of our game. This is not true,” he says. The club’s total earnings of € 190 million between 2011 and 2019 make this year’s loss easier to bear, he argues. “Because our base economic situation is strong, this will not affect us in the same way that other clubs probably will.”
Possible delays to Espai Barça
The club is busy looking in its budget for costs to cut, from scrapping the welcome pack for new partners to save on schedule Espai Barça.
The “Barça Space” is intended to be a large plaza with a renovated Camp Nou along with a new interior arena, club offices, restaurants and a modernized megastore and museum. The club has called it “the best sports complex in the world in the center of a big city”. The site’s completion date was delayed last year from 2022 to 2024, but the projected budget of € 630 million now seems overstated.
Cardoner says Barça will prioritize renovating the stadium itself and may finish the other facilities later.
Internal fight on the board
Cardoner is one of the last senior directors to remain faithful to Bartomeu. Why did six directors resign last month, bringing the board’s total resignations to 11 under Bartomeu? Cardoner replies, “This is part of human relationships. These colleagues did not agree with several things we decided. They made this decision. We absolutely accept it. Then we have to continue. This is not a dictatorship.”
But this is a club plunged, like almost all its rivals, in an unimaginable crisis.
