Search: ' Catalonia'

Dermot Corrigan lifts the lid on the civil action launched against former Barcelona owner Joan Laporta over the money he lost while at the club

Forcing unduly spendthrift owners or executives to repay club money they’ve squandered sounds like a dream for fans of many teams. But that’s what might be about to happen at Barcelona. At a general assembly of club members on October 16, new Barça president Sandro Rosell outlined the immensity of the debt his predecessor Joan Laporta had left behind, and proposed Laporta be held responsible. Rosell abstained in the ensuing vote, but was unlikely to have been disappointed when the motion was passed. A civil action has been launched which could force Laporta to personally pay the club €48.7 million (£42.3m).

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Football Artistry and Political Intrigue
by Tim Hanlon
Peakpublish, £12.99
Reviewed by Dermot Corrigan
From WSC 293 July 2011

Buy this book

A Catalan Dream opens in 2003 with the coming to power of new FC Barcelona president Joan Laporta, who – along with then sidekick Sandro Rosell – sets about modernising a club which had been on the slide. They appoint Frank Rijkaard as manager, negotiate new merchandising and TV deals, renovate the fabled La Masía youth academy and on-field success soon follows.

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There is a section of Italy that it using football as a way of campaigning for independence. Matthew Barker tells all

Last month’s European and local elections saw the Lega Nord increase its support base beyond the traditional heartland of the Veneto and Lombardy in the north-east of Italy, reaching as far down as Emilia Romagna and the northern edges of Tuscany. The Lega, seeking to break away from the national government in Rome and the Mezzogiorno south, forms a strong coalition with Silvio Berlusconi’s ruling People of Freedom party, and has been steadily winning over disgruntled voters with far-right policies based exclusively around twin obsessions of immigration and security.

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Barcelona’s defeat of Manchester United was considered a victory for good in the press. But is it really so simple, asks Ashley Shaw

So good triumphed over evil in football’s version of the moral maze. Fan-owned Barcelona, the club that proclaims itself as mes que un club (more than a club), Catalonia’s national team, won the European Cup at a canter by beating privately-owned, debt-saddled Manchester United where the ticket prices make your eyes water and the PR spin-cycle is always on high.

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Now definitively part of Germany, for a while the Saar’s status was in flux. And, for a fleeting moment in history, the region was also an unlikely centre of footballing attention, explains Paul Joyce

The golden age of football in the Saar – today a region of Germany that borders Luxembourg and France – was a by-product of the tug-of-war over its political status.

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