Joan Laporta vows to sever Barcelona ties with Qatar Airways

Andy West 08:48 23/06/2015
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  • Part of the success story: Barcelona celebrate their Champions League win.

    Joan Laporta will end Barcelona’s sponsorship deal with Qatar Airways and restore children’s charity Unicef to the team’s playing shirts if he wins this summer’s presidential election at the Nou Camp.

    Along with the announcement that hugely popular former defender Eric Abidal will be his technical director, the proclamation that Unicef will be given pride of place was the centrepiece of Laporta’s first press conference to kick off his campaign on Monday.

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    Laporta served as Barca’s president between 2003 and 2010, enjoying a huge amount of success on the pitch before being forced to leave the post after completing the maximum possible term and being succeeded by Sandro Rosell.

    But Rosell was forced to resign last year after finding himself accused of helping the club to evade tax during the signing of Neymar from Santos in the summer of 2013.

    Although Rosell was replaced by his deputy Josep Maria Bartomeu, who will be Laporta’s main opponent in next month’s election, the Neymar scandal is just one of many controversies to have dogged the current regime’s time in power.

    Barca have also been hit by a transfer ban from FIFA after breaking regulations on the signing of youngsters from overseas, and many fans have been dismayed by the Qatar Airways sponsorship deal, which was signed  in 2010 for around €30m (Dh125m) a year.
    Laporta has repeatedly criticised that commercial partnership – the first time the club has adopted a paid-for sponsor – and with the contract expiring next year, appears in no mood to extend it, should he win the election on July 18. 

    Laporta said: “We want Unicef back on the front of the Barca shirt. It has lost its meaning on the back of the shirt. The club has many other ways of generating revenue. It is a matter or values. I want to rescue the values of our club.”

    Making it clear that he is perfectly prepared to use the criminal allegations levelled against his opponent Bartomeu, Laporta added: “The choice is between a Barca in the courts with Rosell and Bartomeu, or Unicef and those that are clean.”

    And Laporta’s populist campaign struck another significant blow with the news that Abidal will be a central part of his plans.

    The French defender became an iconic figure for the club’s fans after successfully battling through cancer during his playing days at the Nou Camp, and many supporters were appalled by Rosell’s failure to give him a new contract when he left the club in 2013.

    His inclusion in Laporta’s team could prove a decisive factor in the campaign, with the Frenchman given specific responsibility for reviving the fortunes of the club’s La Masia youth academy, which has seen its previous regular supply of first-teamers dry up in recent years.

    Midfielder Rafinha is the only regular member of the current senior squad to have progressed through the youth system in the last three years, and Abidal said: “We want to return to producing players like Iniesta, Messi and Xavi.”

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