Speaking to the media today, the president of FC Barcelona explained that he had waited before responding to the many accusations this season due to “social and sporting responsibility”.
Claim against COPE
“There are two ways of acting”, said the FCB president about the claim for libel
against the radio station. “We have worked with the facts, with our claim against COPE and
the appeal to UEFA, using words”. In particular reference to COPE, Rosell said “we are
currently making claims. COPE has imposed measures to delay our intervention. They have put sticks
in the bicycle’s spokes to stop it from going fast, but it is still moving forwards”.
After Sandro Rosell had read out the FC Barcelona institutional statement, he answered questions
about the different accusations against the club over the season. He revealed that it was for
reasons of social responsibility that he had not spoken about these things earlier.
Doing what’s right
He said that the Board had preferred not to interrupt the good performances by the
different teams that were heading for so many titles. “Anything that wasn’t in the
script could have affected what our teams were doing … Events have shown that we did the
right thing. It was right to make this statement today”.
Relations with Real Madrid
Rosell hopes that none of the accusations against FC Barcelona this season will ever
be repeated again, for that could lead to the severing of all relations with Real Madrid. He said
that “there is nothing in life that can’t be sorted out” and that relations with
the all-whites “will get closer and better. The Barça values include human quality and this
always offers a second chance. And we want to give it a second chance”.
As for Real Madrid president, Florentino Pérez, Rosell does not think he was the main man
behind what went on, but “got dragged into it … but he is still the leading figure at
his club”.
Dignified behaviour
The Barça president said that from now on he expects what is famously known in
Catalan as ‘seny’ to govern the way the institutions behave. He admitted that this has
been an uncomfortable year, and that “we are sports people and in sport you can always win or
lose but always within the boundaries of the field of play.” However “I had to explain
what has happened … I hope it never happens again. And if it never happens again, we’ll
have achieved our objective.”.
Standing by Guardiola
Asked for his reaction to the comments by Madrid manager José Mourinho about the
doubts surrounding the way Barcelona had won certain titles, Rosell said “if a high executive
or employee of Barça had done what Mourinho did, he would get a warning”. The president
agreed with what Guardiola said before the Champions League first leg against Madrid and said it
was something he would rather not talk about. “Everybody has their area of action and we are
now speaking as an institution. At that time, Pep was speaking as one coach to another”.
Rosell also denied that he had failed to protect his first team coach properly. “Barça
was always behind him. We have done more than we have spoken about, we did a lot”.