|
Barcelona Football Club has just announced or perhaps more correctly someone within it has ‘leaked’ details of their new strip for the 2016 – 2017 season. If that first sentence has just caused your eyes to glaze over with indifference because you’re less than interested in football and even less in the kit being worn by the players, it’s still worth reading on. That’s because this process is an interesting illustration of the links between big business, football and the media. Nothing Controversial In theory, this type of story shouldn’t get a lot of global attention but in this case it has. Football kits have been controversial before in the United Kingdom, perhaps to a greater extent than is the case in Spain and Catalonia. Questions have been asked as to why football clubs have to change their strips so regularly, with all that means for the financially hard-pressed parents of children and wider families overall, as they try to buy expensive shirts to match the latest version. However, this announcement has two additional interesting features. Sponsorship and Leaks The leaked home strip is notable for the absence of the logo of one of Barcelona’s major international sponsors. That is presumably because at the time of writing, the deal has not yet been finalized and closed. It’s therefore difficult not to be tempted by the slightly conspiratorial thought that the leak to the media is possibly related to those ongoing sponsorship discussions. Is it perhaps a coded way of saying “get a move on or we’ll go without you”? The links between massively successful football clubs, the media and corporate dealings are hardly news. They have been around for a long time and Barcelona FC will no doubt operate in that domain, just like every other major international brand football club. This sort of thing though is unusual and it’s great fun to speculate just how much ‘incentive’ might have been given to the sponsor’s negotiations by the appearance of this shot in the public domain without their logo? Barcelona as an Institution For all that, Barcelona FC isn’t just a club like any other. It is a major expression of Catalan culture and identity, as well as to all intents and purposes, virtually a collective being owned by its own fans. Whatever machinations might take place, in terms of media leaks and corporate haggling, those fundamental things are extremely unlikely to ever change. Getting There If you are in Barcelona and would like to visit the club’s famous ground and its interesting exhibits, you can take a taxi from Barcelona Airport directly to the Nou Camp ground. If you’re already in the city centre, try the TMB and AMB lines, both of which have several services passing close by. The L3 and L4 Metro lines both have stations between 500 metres and a kilometre away. T1, T2 and T3 tramway lines all have stations close by too. Lukas Johannes is a driver for Shuttle Direct, the number one provider of shared and private airport transfers all over Europe and northern Africa. If you’re looking for an affordable taxi from Barcelona Airport, Lukas and his colleagues can make sure that you and your luggage get to and from the airport swiftly and safely.
Related Articles -
Taxi, from, Barcelona, Airport,
| 
