As FC Barcelona ushers in a new era under President Sandro Rosell, it’s puzzling how the club has dealt with the media regarding its lack of exposure in the US via Barça TV and its nonexistent or unavailable online Barça TV service. Additionally, the club’s lack of action against other media outlets fabricating stories and painting the club and its players in a bad image is disheartening. Why do we have to rely on just Sid Lowe and Graham Hunter to stick up for the club and not threaten legal action itself against the Daily Express and Marca? This is a new era and this is a great time to usher in new changes and take advantage of promoting the club when it is considered one of the greatest in the world. Opportunity is knocking, so will the club answer?
I want to first emphasize that is not a direct attack at club president Sandro Rosell. Those who know me know I am not a big admirer of him but this is not an attack at the president as much as it is call for the club to address this problem that I feel many Barça fans are dealing with. I am upset that there is no US media outlet showing Barça TV and that the online version of Barça TV no longer exists. I am upset that the Daily Express can go ahead and print made up interviews with our players that depict them and the club in a negative light and yet the club fails to come out and denounce these interviews. I am disappointed that the club does not respond to Marca’s garbage cover depicting our manager Guardiola as refusing to shake Real Madrid’s hands. I really think that the club’s image is hampered by lack of exposure and its failure to fight back at the media outlets who try to make a mockery of our beloved club.
Barça TV first made its debut in 1999 as Canal Barça as the rights were held by Telefónica Sports. In 2004, the club regained total control of the channel and renamed it Barça TV. Over the years, Barça TV was used by the club to show exclusive coverage of player signings, interviews, highlights of former players, archived matches from the past and replays of current matches. To expand its appeal across the globe, Barça TV aired in Catalan, in Spanish and in English. We were fortunate enough to be able to catch some of what Barça TV offered when Fox Soccer Channel presented a Barça TV segment. That usually consisted of matches from years ago and replays of the most recent Champions League match with some highlights regarding past and present players. Fast forward to now, and I checked FSC and Barça TV was not listed and overall, it is not on the air in the US. In a day where we have Gol TV, FSC, ESPN Deportes and ESPN 3 providing us ton of football coverage, Barça TV is nowhere to be seen when they are
considered one of the best clubs in the world. It was nice that ESPN Deportes showed us the Joan Gamper Trofeo match while the Supercopa was never aired in the US and that is mostly the LFP’s fault for not trying to promote its league properly.
Barça TV Online was launched back in 2007 and allowed fans to subscribe to their service and enjoy the channel online. That was a great idea that would attract more fans to the club. However, have you checked it out lately and tried to access it? Pay a visit to the English Barça TV page on the official site where it asks you to choose either Canal TV or ON LINE and then click on ON LINE and see where it takes you. Surprised? I sure am. I expect that from a fan site but not from an official club’s website. Just recently, the club announced on its website that Barça TV underwent a new look with a new slogan – “Back to Normal People.” Well, here’s hoping that these issues get resolved so we can have Barça TV back in the US airwaves and thus better promote the club to a growing fan base here in the US.
This past summer transfer window saw the club painted in a negative light when its pursuit of Cesc was not warmly welcomed. Part of the problem was some of the club’s players such as Puyol and Xavi making some pretty blatant and tasteless comments that made them look like jerks. The Daily Express supposedly had an interview with Xavi in which he said that Cesc was basically on loan at Arsenal while The Sun published an interview with Puyol saying “He is having to stay at a club where he no longer wants to be for another year”. David Villa supposedly had an interview with The Sun and there was also a story about Messi tweeting “The Villa vs. West Ham match is really exciting – Ashley Young is having a blinder”. Here’s the thing though, these players never ever said those things. It appears to be common knowledge among Barcelona fans that these players never said it. Messi doesn’t even have a twitter page, that was a fake account. Puyol does have a personal blog and stated “Hola a todos, estos últimos días en aalgún medio de comunicación inglés han salido unas declaraciones supuestamente mías que son totalmente falsas, las acabo de ver ahora y puedo asegurar que no he dicho nada ni he hablado con nadie sobre este tema. Saludos.” ( translation courtesy of Totalbarca.com -“Hi everyone, these past days a British news media outlet has published some statements supposedly mine that are totally fasse, I just saw them and I can guarantee that I have not said anything nor talked to anybody about this subject. Cheers.”)
Pretty outrageous and we actually had Sid Lowe come to the rescue when asked about these interviews in his article about Zlatan’s transfer. Here was his reply - “I am absolutely bloody furious about this and it has become a constant this summer. The quotes are almost entirely concocted and I am pretty sure that I know how it is happening. Me and a couple of other journalists who actually try (yes, yes, don't always succeed) to do the job properly and who are here in Spain are trying to do something about it. But it's not easy.” It was great to see someone come out and explain it to everybody, especially the EPL fans, that the stories were bogus.
This is not just limited to the English press, but Madrid daily Marca resorted to its shameful procedure of creating something out o nothing when its cover page depicted our manager Pep Guardiol not wanting to shake Mourinho’s hand as he put his hand out What the poor excuse of a sport daily failed to do was show the hug between Guardiola and Mourinho.
Fortunately, Graham Hunter came to the rescue and said on his twitter account (have to scroll down to dig it up) – “Marca front page not cheeky, just false this am. Snatched pic from Pep, Mou & Platini CHAT. Mou making point. NOT Pep rejecting handshake.” As much as I was pleased to see some journalists out there actually doing a great honor to their profession and sticking up for the club, where was the club in all this?
It would have been nice for the club to come out and threaten legal against all those publication that published these fake interviews. The club recently stated that they were on good terms with Arsenal or rebuilding their relationship but I am sure denouncing those interviews help a lot more especially when it seems many bought those interviews hook, line and sinker. The club should always back its players and this was a situation where they dropped the ball. By remaining silent, they are allowing for further fake interviews to be released in the near future. As for Marca, the club perhaps doesn’t want to dignify Marca’s cover with a response but coming out with a polite but cheeky reply to make them look bad would have been nice. We know the Madrid sports daily will have their moments where we have to roll our eyes but perhaps the club should sometimes come out and denounce these types of covers solely created to generate more sales. The image of the club is very important and we cannot allow other to sully it with over the top generalizations or fake interviews.
