He Camp Nou It was never the Bombonera or De Kuip, nor did its spectators ever resemble the yellow wall of Signal Iduna Park, where 25,000 human beings, without seats, push their team from the vertical south stand of the stadium until exhaustion. Barça is recognized more by the spirit of the tribune, which whispers from the first pass that the team makes a mistake every game day, the one that marches between five and ten minutes before the end of the game.
But few stadiums have the intimidating capacity of the Camp Nou, with a hundred thousand souls singing, almost a cappella, the ‘cant’ of Barça as the players leave. Today Montjuïc has become a museum that can be visited on match day. We have sweetened that ‘match day’ for the outsider. This tourist has systematically replaced the fan because he is a consumer who can leave large income at the box office. Football is becoming a product, a ‘premium’ experience packaged to be sold to the highest bidder..
Barça plays in a full, but empty stadium. Full of tourists, raised cell phones, selfies, brand new t-shirts. Empty of soul, of members, of those people who feel the club as an extension of their own skin. The result is a mostly silent stand. The songs are the gasoline for the team that is lacking today. The much-needed cheering stands, the one that pushed the rest of the stadium to cheer, is missing. for being critical of the box.
There begins, but does not end, the responsibility of the board that has managed the stadium and the social mass. with the logic of business, not with that of feelingwhen he stops thinking only about his partner. In his desire to monetize every seat, every square meter, every minute of the game, he has emptied of content what made the club unique: its people. Without fans there is no epic. Without emotion there is no identity. Without noise there is no football (for silence, we already have El Liceu).
The contrast is painful. While other European clubs have managed to maintain a popular crowd that vibrates, encourages and pushes, Barça has allowed its temple to become a silent showcase. In Dormunt there is passion. At Anfield there is communion. In Montjuïc, today, there is an echo. Let’s hope the same thing doesn’t happen at the Nou Camp Nou when we return. It is more than a warning for sailors.
It is incomprehensible that the box only denotes institutional indifference to the loss of the culé atmosphere. Neither ‘força’, nor ‘ànima’, nor ‘rauxa’, nor ‘culerada’. On match day at the ‘Estadi’, when it comes back, it cannot be a ‘duty free’. We must return to being a sanctuary, that which is so much ours.. Recovering passion is not an aesthetic or marketing issue, it is a clearly urgent moral and competitive issue. The club that was ‘more than a club’ cannot be content with being a football theme park. It’s not just about selling tickets, but about recovering belonging and pride.