Futbol Club Barcelona (Catalan pronunciation: , Spanish: [ˈfuðβol kluβ βarθeˈlona]), also known simply as Barcelona and familiarly as Barça (Catalan: [ˈbaɾsə], Spanish: [ˈbarsa]), is a football club based in Barcelona, Catalonia, Spain. The team was founded in 1899 by a group of Swiss, English and Spanish men led by Joan Gamper. The club has become a Catalan institution, hence the motto "Més que un club" (More than a club). The official Barça anthem is El Cant del Barça by Josep Maria Espinàs.
FC Barcelona is one of only three clubs never to have been relegated from La Liga and is the most successful club in Spanish football along with Real Madrid, having won twenty La Liga titles, a record twenty-five Spanish Cups, eight Spanish Super Cups, four Eva Duarte Cups and two League Cups. They are also one of the most successful clubs in European football having won fourteen official major trophies in total, including ten UEFA competitions.[1] They have won three UEFA Champions League titles, a record four UEFA Cup Winners' Cups, a record three Inter-Cities Fairs Cups (the forerunner to the UEFA Europa League), three UEFA Super Cups and one FIFA Club World Cup. The club is also the only European side to have played continental football in every season since its inception in 1955.
In 2009, Barcelona became the first club in Spain to win the treble of La Liga, Copa del Rey and Champions League. FC Barcelona also became the first football team ever to win six out of six competitions in a single year thus completing the sextuple, comprising the 2008–09 La Liga, 2008–09 Copa del Rey, 2009 Supercopa de España, 2008–09 UEFA Champions League, 2009 UEFA Super Cup and 2009 FIFA Club World Cup.
Barcelona holds a long-standing rivalry with Real Madrid, with matches between the two teams referred to as "El Clásico". Unlike many other football clubs, the fans of FC Barcelona own and operate the club. The club is the world's second richest football club (€365m) in terms of revenue, only surpassed by Real Madrid.
Birth of FC Barcelona (1899–1922)
On 22 October 1899, Joan Gamper placed an advert in Los Deportes declaring his wish to form a football club. A positive response resulted in a meeting at the Gimnasio Solé on 29 November where eleven players attended: Walter Wild, later to become the first director of the club, Lluís d'Ossó, Bartomeu Terradas, Otto Kunzle, Otto Maier, Enric Ducal, Pere Cabot, Carles Pujol, Josep Llobet, John Parsons and William Parsons. As a result Foot-Ball Club Barcelona was born.[2]
Sports Notice: Our friend and companion Hans Gamper... former Swiss [football] champion, being keen on organising some football games in the city asks anyone who feels enthusiastic enough about the sport to present themselves at the office of this newspaper any Tuesday or Friday evening between the hours of 9 and 11pm.
– Gampers ad in Los Deportes, Ball, Phil page 89
Legend has it that Gamper was inspired to choose the club blue and red colours by FC Basel's crest. However, the Swiss team Gamper played for, FC Excelsior in his home canton of Zürich, and Merchant Taylors' School in Crosby, Merseyside, England have also been credited with or claimed to be the inspiration.[3] FC Barcelona quickly emerged as one of the leading clubs in Spain, competing in the Campeonato de Cataluña and the Copa del Rey. In 1902, the club won its first trophy, the Copa Macaya, and also played in the first Copa del Rey final, losing 2–1 to Bizcaya.[4]
In 1908, Joan Gamper became club president for the first time as he took over the presidency in order to save the club from disappearing altogether.[2] The club had not won anything since the Campeonato de Cataluña in 1905 and as a result got into financial trouble. Gamper was subsequently club president on five separate occasions between 1908 and 1925 and spent 25 years at the helm. One of his main achievements was to help Barça acquire its own stadium and thus achieve a means of generating stable income.[2]
On 14 March 1909, the team moved into the Camp de la Indústria, a stadium with a capacity of 8,000. Gamper launched a campaign to recruit more club members and by 1922, the club had over 10,000. This led to the club moving again, this time to Las Cortes, which they inaugurated the same year. Las Cortes had an initial capacity of 22,000, which was later expanded to 60,000.[5]
Gamper recruited Jack Greenwell as the first full-time manager in Barcelona's history. This saw the club's fortunes begin to improve on the field. During the Gamper era FC Barcelona won eleven Campeonato de Cataluña, six Copa del Rey and four Pyrenees Cups and enjoyed its first "golden age".[4]
Rivera, Republic and Civil War (1923–1957)
On 14 June 1925 in a spontaneous reaction against Primo de Rivera's dictatorship, the crowd in the stadium jeered the Royal March.[5] As a reprisal, the ground was closed for six months and Gamper was forced to relinquish the presidency of the club. In 1928, victory in the Spanish Cup was celebrated with a poem titled "Oda a Platko", which was written by a member of the Generation of '27, inspired by the heroic performance of the Barcelona keeper. On 30 July 1930, Gamper committed suicide after a period of depression brought on by personal and financial problems.[2]
Although they continued to have players of the standing of Josep Escolà, the club now entered a period of decline, in which political conflict overshadowed sport throughout society. Barça faced a crisis on three fronts: financially, politically and in sporting terms.[5] Although the team won the Campionat de Catalunya in 1930, 1931, 1932, 1934, 1936 and 1938,[4] success at a national level (with the exception of the 1937 disputed title) evaded them.
A month after the Spanish Civil War began in 1936, club president Josep Sunyol was murdered by rebel soldiers near Guadarrama. In the summer of 1937, the squad was on tour in Mexico and the United States, where it was received as an ambassador of the Second Spanish Republic. That tour led to the financial security of the club, but also resulted in half the team seeking asylum in Mexico and France. On 16 March 1938, the fascists dropped a bomb on the club's offices which caused significant damage. A few months later, Barcelona was under fascist occupation and as a symbol of the 'undisciplined' Catalanism, the club, now down to just 3,486 members, faced a number of serious problems.[5]
After the Civil War, the Catalan flag was banned and football clubs were prohibited from using non-Spanish names. These measures led to the club having its name forcibly changed to Club de Fútbol Barcelona and the removal of the Catalan flag from the club shield.[5]
In 1943, Barcelona faced rivals Real Madrid in the semi-finals of Copa del Generalísimo. The first match at Les Corts was won by Barcelona 3–0. Before the second leg, Barcelona's players had a changing room visit from Franco's director of state security. He 'reminded' them that they were only playing due to the 'generosity of the regime'. Real Madrid dominated the match, thrashing Barça 11–1.[6]
Despite the difficult political situation, CF Barcelona enjoyed considerable success during the 1940s and 1950s. In 1945, with Josep Samitier as coach and players like César, Ramallets and Velasco, they won La Liga for the first time since 1929. They added two more titles in 1948 and 1949. In 1949, they also won the first Copa Latina. In June 1950, Barcelona signed Ladislao Kubala, who was to be an influential figure at the club.
On a rainy Sunday of 1951, the crowd left Les Corts stadium after a 2–1 win against Santander by foot, refusing to catch any trams and surprising the Francoist authorities. The reason was simple: at the same time a tram strike was taking place in Barcelona, receiving the support of blaugrana fans. Events such as this made FC Barcelona represent much more than just Catalonia and many progressive Spaniards see the club as a staunch defender of rights and freedoms.[7]
Coach Fernando Daucik and Ladislao Kubala, regarded by many as the club's best ever player, inspired the team to five different trophies including La Liga, the Copa del Generalísimo, the Copa Latina, the Copa Eva Duarte and the Copa Martini Rossi in 1952. In 1953, they helped the club win La Liga and the Copa del Generalísimo again.[5]
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