Joan Laporta, president of Barcelona, did not confirm when he was asked if the club could return on time for their planned La Liga debut in Camp Nou. Their renovation work in the stadium has been on schedule for eight months and will be delayed at least ten months.
The club had announced their return before August 10, where they would host the Joan Gamper Trophy match against Como. Nevertheless, it was confirmed this week that the game would take place in the 6000-seat places Johan Cruyff Stadium in the club's sports complex. Speaking in an interview with MD, Laporta could only say that their return would be as soon as possible.
“I don't know when, but as soon as possible. One thing here is that the working volume worked and the conversations with the city council led us to revise the work plan, and this had an impact on the established deadlines that we had previously established, although we proposed to launch the Spotify Camp Nou through sectors. Occupation permit, which is missing.”
Laporta confirmed that the plan was to keep the Joan Gamper trophy in Camp Nou, “if there were no setbacks.” Their plan was to host 27,000-32,000 fans who only open certain sections of the stadium, and on the wisdom of setting a return date, said: “If you don't set dates, you don't make any voltage either.”
The next big question is whether Camp Nou is ready for the weekend of September 14, the date of the first game of Barcelona against Valencia. If that is not the case, Montjuic organizes a post Malone concert on the 12th, which may be excluded from the Estadi Olimpic Lluis Company. Laporta rejected the idea of moving the concert.
“I think there will always be solutions. We are actually working to return to Spotify Camp Nou. There are alternatives, but these are unforeseen circumstances that we are not considering now. We are aimed at returning to Camp Nou to Spotify.”
It was confirmed that they asked for their first Champions League match to be away from home. On the prospect to return to Montjuic for a longer period this season, Laporta explained that the financial side of the things that made differently.
“We are not considering the possibility of not returning. All budgets we have done for next season and all the obligations we have included under the financing contract are included in return to the Spotify Camp Nou. We should do everything again. We are used to dealing with complicated situations, but we always hope that things will calm down when time comes.”
When the deal with the Limak construction group was announced, Barcelona made a point of emphasizing a delay clause, in which the Turkish company would be liable for a payment of € 1 million for each day that the project was on schedule. Exercising that clause would be worth hundreds of millions, but Laporta said they were reluctant to do this.
“I hope it is not about to claim fines because it is true that a series of fines has been collected because of delays in certain phases of the project, but we cannot immediately blame them for these delays. There have been one, which is normal for a project like this.”
“We also understand. What we want is to finish the work, not to claim fines. We want this to be over as quickly as possible. We have a highly motivated company as Limak. We are all in the same boat. We are like a family; we meet each other every two weeks. The owner of Limak is coming, the CEO, who is his children, who works for the company, comes for the company.”
“They know they have built up fines, but they are convinced that if the objectives are achieved, this will be negotiated. And I think there will be no problems in this respect, because what we want is that the project is completed, with the level of quality and safety that we all want.”
Barcelona plays their first three LA Liga matches away from home, as agreed with the competition to facilitate their return. The club has expressed the confidence that this has no influence on the inclusion of their VIP rental agreement of € 100 million in their salary limit.