At this point, there are few doubts: the new Camp Nou is born crooked. In 2006 –16 years!–, the work was going to bear the glamorous seal of Norman Foster. In 2016, that of the prestigious Japanese firm Nikken Sekkei. Since the night before last, September 2022, and not because FC Barcelona has made the official announcement that the matter would deserve, the remodeling - imminent! - falls on Torrella Engineering, a company from Terrassa, specialized in industrial buildings.
Music, teacher!
When the ball enters, transparency, good management and seriousness move away. And the ideal days for waste appear and with waste, corruption. Whenever the little ball comes in (Laporta in 2006, Bartomeu in 2016 and Laporta II today), the new Camp Nou changes its model. Sometimes he dresses as a cosmopolitan and another as a pubilla. But time passes and the Camp Nou is going from a vintage to a dandruff stadium, courtesy of the cracks, deficiencies and aged appearance.
It is surprising –and feeds the bad thoughts– that FC Barcelona has not announced the news with light and stenographers. The reconstruction has been taken away from a rigorous and solvent architect, Fermín Vázquez, "heir" to the commission from Nikkei Sekkei, to be awarded without further explanation or arguments to Torrella Engineering, an irreproachable company with sixty years of experience, but in industrial buildings. And all in half light...
The FC Barcelona accounts are always very much yours. The member/fan/client/consumer does not pay much attention or expect dividends at the end of the financial year, but rather goals, titles, passions. Business management does not give a damn, except if there is no money to sign or he senses a rise in the fee. And nothing surprises him: FC Barcelona has been the club that has spent the most on transfers this summer while everyone - starting with its board - repeated that the economic situation was dramatic.
The umpteenth twist on the works of the Camp Nou – so last minute, so prone to mischief – comes in those relaxed states of the fan, ideal for the good pickpocket. It will not cause delays! Hard to believe. And we are talking about 16 years lost, with the aggravating circumstance that Barça, unlike Real Madrid, has wasted the period of the pandemic.
Unlike accounts, the stadium does matter to the fan. And it is decisive to feed the "brand" for market purposes. We speak, then, of something tangible, of the last umbilical cord that unites the follower with the entity. From the place where they took him as a child and he was caught. Laporta's board will have its reasons for this unexpected change. And one of theirs to distrust.
