Football Club Barcelona . The club has become a Catalan institution, hence the motto Més que un club (More than a club).
They were founding member of La Liga in 1928, and, together with Real Madrid and Athletic Bilbao, they have never been relegated from the top division. The club were also the first La Liga champions, winning a total of 18 La Liga, 24 Copa del Rey, 7 Supercopa de España, 2 UEFA Champions League, 4 UEFA Cup Winners' Cup, 3 Inter-Cities Fairs Cup and 2 European Super Cup trophies.
The club's main stadium is the Camp Nou and the fans of FC Barcelona are known as culés. In Spain, about 25% of the population are said to be Barça supporters.
In June 2007, the number of socis (club members/owners) reached 156,366, while in June 2006 the number of penyes (officially-registered supporter clubs) reached 1782 worldwide.
The club also operate a reserve team, FC Barcelona Atlètic, and four other professional sports teams, Regal FC Barcelona, FC Barcelona, FC Barcelona Futsal and FC Barcelona Sorli Discau that compete at basketball, handball, futsal and rink hockey respectively. Until 2007 there was also a youth team, FC Barcelona C.
On the 19th January 2009, the FC Barcelona first team left their regular training pitch located next to the Camp Nou and moved to the modern Joan Gamper Sports City located close to the Camp Nou a few kilometres outside Barcelona, at St Joan Despi. This sports city is home to all of the clubs sports entities including the famous La Masia youth teams. The Sports city includes various state of the art facilities that allow FC Barcelona players and staff to train and prepare for their various sports in the best possible conditions.
During the 2006-07 season, FC Barcelona was the third richest club in the world with a revenue of €291.1 million., the club, now down to just 3,486 members, was facing a number of serious problems.
Dream Team and Centenari (1988-2000)
In 1988 Johan Cruyff returned to the club as manager and assembled the so-called Dream Team, named after the US basketball team that played at the 1992 Summer Olympics hosted by Barcelona. He introduced players like Josep Guardiola, José Mari Bakero, Txiki Beguiristáin, Jon Andoni Goikoetxea, Gheorghe Hagi, Ronald Koeman, Michael Laudrup, Romário and Hristo Stoichkov.
Under Cruyff's guidance, Barcelona won four consecutive La Liga titles from 1991 to 1994. They beat Sampdoria in both the 1989 UEFA Cup Winners' Cup final and the 1992 European Cup final at Wembley with a legendary free kick goal from Dutch international Ronald Koeman. They also won a Copa del Rey in 1990, the European Super Cup in 1992 and three Supercopa de España. With 11 trophies, Cruijff became the club's most successful manager to date. He also became the club's longest serving manager. However, in his final two seasons, he failed to win any trophies (not to mention the disastrous 4-0 defeat in the UEFA Champions League 1994 final against AC Milan) and fell out with president Núñez, resulting in Cruijff's departure.
Cruijff was briefly replaced by Bobby Robson who took charge of the club for a single season in 1996/97. He recruited Ronaldo from his previous club, PSV Eindhoven and delivered a cup treble winning the Copa del Rey, UEFA Cup Winners Cup and the Supercopa de España. Despite his success, Robson was only ever seen as a short-term solution while the club waited for Louis van Gaal to become available.
Like Maradona, Ronaldo only stayed a short time and he left for Inter Milan. However, new heroes such as Luís Figo, Patrick Kluivert, Luis Enrique Martínez and Rivaldo emerged and the team won a Copa del Rey/La Liga double in 1998. In 1999 the club celebrated its 'centenari' winning the Primera División title and Rivaldo became the fourth Barça player to be awarded European Footballer of the Year. Despite this domestic success, the failure to emulate Real Madrid in the UEFA Champions League led to van Gaal and Núñez resigning in 2000.
After this era, Barcelona was going to be Dream Team again and I think this year is the exact time for them to be THE BEST OF THE BEST!
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i agree with your opinion...
ReplyDeletenowadays, barca is one of the greatest football team in Europe.
Messi is star in FC Barca...
so... please comment my "Messi" in Kosayu 1
Bravo Barca!!!!!
P.Q
Thanks for your agreement...
ReplyDeleteBy the way, I can't give you a comment because I can't find your post...
What was the title of your post?and when you post it?January or February?
Barcelona has undergone a brilliant season. Who can ever guest they will become unbelievably powerfull this season? I bet they might actually win this season's UEFA Champions League title!
ReplyDeleteYes,they had unbeliavably power in this season...
ReplyDeleteI assume they will get all title that they could gain in this season...
And surely, it's possible for them to win the UEFA Champions League title again...