Josep Maria Bartomeu believes Louis van Gaal will succeed as Manchester United manager, the Barcelona president citing how the Dutchman developed some of the Catalan club’s finest talents while in charge. Van Gaal brought through players such as Xavi Hernández, Andrés Iniesta and Carles Puyol during his spells at the Camp Nou.
Van Gaal was twice coach of Barça. The first spell was from 1997-2000, the second between 2002-03. He gave debuts to Xavi in 1998 and to Puyol the following year before, on his return, he handed Iniesta his first-team bow in October 2002. All three players have gone on to grace world football, adding titles galore domestically and on the national stage with Spain.
Asked about Van Gaal’s hope of success with United, who play Barça on Saturday at the home of the San Francisco 49ers, Bartomeu said: “Yes, it’s a good move. We know him from when he was at Barcelona and you have to remember that one of our best players of the past 15 years, Xavi, was brought through by Van Gaal. He put Xavi, Puyol and others into the first team. Van Gaal did something very good by having a lot of confidence in our young players. The youth players of our academy, La Masia, he used them a lot and he was right because for the last 12 or 15 years those players have been the best players in our team.
“We know how strong, intelligent and clever he is, how he gets the best that is possible from his players, and United are going to be one of the top clubs this year, I’m sure.”
This week Karl-Heinz Rummenigge, the Bayern Munich chief executive, voiced concern that the super-rich Premier League may “empty” the Bundesliga of its best players. Bartomeu has no concerns, despite La Liga moving to a collective television deal from next year.
“It’s true that the Premier League right now is the best league competition in the world, not only in a sporting way but in terms of income, too,” he said. “The new television rights contract with the Premier League is something that the rest of the leagues, including La Liga, have to follow. Now in Spain we have a new law that obliges the clubs to sell all the TV rights jointly because we have to follow the Premier League.
“But we are going to fight against the Premier League. I talk about competition because we want to have the best players in our league. Barcelona and Real Madrid, we are the biggest clubs, but also other clubs like Atlético Madrid, Valencia, Sevilla or Athletic Bilbao are doing a nice job. I am sure that they are going to try to have big talent too. This is also a nice competition and we want people to watch it, not only the Premier League.
“Barcelona’s income this year has increased to more than €600m [£424m], which is a record. No other club in the world has as big an income as Barcelona. We work hard, we know that the competition is getting closer, with the Premier League, Madrid of course but also PSG in France, Bayern Munich in Germany, so we have to do our best and our best is trying to get as much income as possible so we can try to have the best players and we want them to be paid at the level they are.”
Last season Barça become the first European club to achieve a second treble of domestic league, domestic cup and Champions League. Can the side led by Lionel Messi do so again?
“You know that last year was fantastic for us, a wonderful season, probably the best season in our history because we won everything and also with very good statistics,” the president said.
“This year we have tried to work with the same team but also bring in some players who can give us a bit more competition, like Arda Turan and Aleix Vidal, and also two young players, like Sandro and Munir. They are coming from our B team and this season will join our A team. So next year, in our opinion, our team will be more competitive.”
Luis Suárez was an undoubted success following his £75m move from Liverpool. “We were delighted,” Bartomeu said. “We knew it was not a gamble. We had been following his progress from a long time ago since his time at Ajax. Then he came to Liverpool but we always knew he was a very good player and the first time we had the chance to bring him to Barcelona we tried and we were successful and I think all our fans and supporters are happy because Suárez brought a surplus – something extra – that helped us to be the best soccer team last season.”
Josep Maria Bartomeu was speaking at the launch of FC Barcelona’s partnership with globalcitizen.org and The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation to collaborate to end extreme poverty by the year 2030
