Only a stratospheric footballer by the name of Leo managed to keep president Bartomeu era from collapsing on Saturday at Barça stadium Camp Nou. His four goals after four rounds of the league without scoring came for Bartomeu at the most timely moment of his declining presidency, having been received at the start of the game with a loud whistling and a white handkerchief protest from the stands, which was repeated with equal force a few minutes later and once again in other moments of the game, though with a lower response.
In a stadium where club members’ patience is infinite, what happened on Saturday at Camp Nou should make Bartomeu reflect. Above all, because, if we could recall a similar protest in the 21st century, this would be what occurred at the end of former Barça president Joan Gaspart’s era. There is, however, an exception that is not less important: the white handkerchiefs and the shouts for his resignation in 2002 appeared after Barça’s defeat against Sevilla and Valencia, being ninth in the classification and 17 points behind the leading team. This time it was at the beginning of the match, challenging Real Madrid’s leadership and with all options in the Champions League open. They are, therefore, different sports crises but they are both, from the institutional point of view, very comparable.
Barça president Bartomeu has saved his first “match ball” and in the following seven days he is facing the Champions League match against Napoli on Tuesday and the one at Bernabeu stadium on Sunday. Although the ball plays, in the end, an important part in football clubs crises, and scores do matter, it is rather likely that, if good results arrive, they only postpone the enormous anger in Barça’s social support. The institutional crisis is here to stay, since the so-called “Barçagate” known this week is extremely serious and questions the board of directors’ management and, obviously, its president’s.
Rather unacceptable are the few explanations given about I3 Ventures’ behaviour, a social data analysis company that went about creating fake profiles on social media to discredit Barça’s internal opposition, players like Gerard Piqué or Leo Messi, emblematic Barça figures like Guardiola or Xavi Hernández or pro-independence political leaders. Luckily, Messi always wants to win and froze the white handkerchief protest with his four goals. But shame will grow too big to hide behind the Argentine’s goals.