Sports

Mireia Belmonte won the 200-metre butterfly this Wednesday and became the first Spanish woman to win an Olympic swimming gold medal. The 25-year-old, trained at Club Natació Sabadell, not only improved her result obtained four years ago in London, where she obtained the silver medal, but registered the fastest time so far this year, 2 minutes 4.85 seconds, beating Australian Maddie Groves by three hundredths of a second. World champion Natsumi Hoshi came third. Belmonte’s gold is to be added to the bronze in the women’s 400m individual medley on Saturday, which was also the first for Spain in any sport at Rio Olympics. The Catalan swimmer’s four medal career haul makes her Spain’s most successful swimmer.

Welcome back to the Camp Nou! August 10 brings the traditional curtain-raiser to the new season as Barça host Sampdoria of Italy in the 51st edition of the Joan Gamper Trophy. This is the last of four friendlies for Barça before things get really serious with the first leg of the Spanish Super Cup on Sunday. UC Sampdoria were Barça’s victims both in the 1989 European Cup Winner’s Cup Final (2-0) and the 1992 European Cup Final (1-0). Luis Enrique promised in his pre-match press conference on Tuesday that absolutely everyone in the squad will be getting a run-out on Wednesday night, including all three goalkeepers, who’ll be getting thirty minutes each. According to the coach, “the Gamper Trophy is always special” and emphasised that this is “the best squad” he has had since joining Barça.

The first medal for the Spanish delegation at the Rio Olympics was brought this Saturday by Catalan swimmer Mireia Belmonte. The record holder from Club NatacióSabadell came third in the women’s 400-metre individual medley, behind Hungarian Katinka Hosszu, who obtained the gold medal, and Maya DiRado from the US, who obtained the silver. The Catalan winner’s registered time was 4:32:39. Thus, Belmonte added a third medal to the two she obtained at the London Olympics in 2012, a silver medal in the 200-metre butterfly and another silver in the 800-metre freestyle. However, Belmonte couldn’t qualify for the 400-metre freestyle. Another Catalan swimmer, Jessica Vall, did classify for the 100-metre breaststroke semi-final. There are 97 Catalans sportsmen and women participating at the Rio Olympics, which represents the highest figure ever, being only higher for the Barcelona Olympics in 1992.

FC Barcelona’s Player, Lionel Messi, and his father Jorge have been sentenced to 21 months in prison after Barcelona’s High Court found them guilty of three counts of tax evasion. The court also ordered the football star to pay a fine of more than 2 MEUR and his father to pay 1.5MEUR. However, as the sentence is under two years, it is unlikely that Messi and his father end up in prison, especially ifthere is no prior criminal report. Moreover, the Court’s decision is not definitive and can still be appealed before Spain's Supreme Court. Messi and his father are accused of having moved 4.1m EUR earned from the player’s image rights to tax havens between 2007 and 2009.  

Leo Messi and his father testified this Thursday before Barcelona’s High Court. They are accused of having moved 4.1m EUR earned from the player’s image rights to tax havens between 2007 and 2009. In his statement, the FC Barcelona player assured that his life is “limited to playing football” and that he had “full confidence” in his father and the lawyers who managed his publicity contracts. This is the same statement that Messi gave in 2013, when he had to testify before the Court for the same case. Spain’s Tax Agency has requested 22 months in prison for each of them for having moved 4.1m EUR earned from publicity contracts to tax havens between 2007 and 2009. On the other hand, the public prosecutor is only accusing Messi’s father.

The Camp Nou was treated to a night of emotions and spectacle – capped when the football squad appeared one by one, in order of shirt numbers, to rapturous cheers from the adoring crowds. Luis Enrique and his staff were also honoured in a fitting tribute to all the hard work they do, and which so often goes unnoticed behind the scenes. Celebrations like this are becoming common place of late at the Camp Nou, and may things remain that way! With 28 titles won in the last decade, the legend just keeps growing. The night erupted in a sea of red and blue confetti and pyrotechnics and so the curtain came down on another triumphant season at FC Barcelona. After the summer, it all starts again!

The victory in the Vicente Calderón strengthens FC Barcelona's position as the most successful team of recent years as they claim the Copa del Rey for the second successive season. Jordi Alba’s goal in the seventh minute of extra time capped a stunning turnaround of events and handed FC Barcelona a well-deserved 2–0 victory over Sevilla in the 2016 Copa del Rey final on Sunday night at the Vicente Calderón Stadium in Madrid. With the La Liga championship already in the bag, Sunday’s Copa del Rey win — the 28th in Club history — means Barça have emerged on top in both of this season’s national competitions, giving them the coveted domestic double and ensuring the 2015/16 season will be hailed as a success for years to come.

The Spanish government’s Delegate in Madrid, Concepción Dancausa, warned that those supporters who attend the Copa del Rey final between Barça and Sevilla carrying pro-independence flags won’t be able to access the stadium. According to Dancausa, 2,500 police agents will work to guarantee the security at Vicente Calderón Stadium in Madrid and will set in place two lines of security controlling access to the arena. Thus, they “will make sure” that nobody is carrying “dangerous items such as or bottles or materials of racist, xenophobic, political or religious propaganda which may lead to public confrontations”, she stated. At the last Champions League final on the 6th June, UEFA fined FC Barcelona for showing pro-independence flags during the match and earlier this year the club was sanctioned with a 30,000 euro fine for the same reason.

Barça earn 24th league success with win at Estadio Nuevo Los Cármenes thanks to a hat-trick from Pichichi Luis Suárez, which confirmed the Uruguayan’s status as the division’s top marksman with 40 goals. All in all, it was a dominant campaign from Barça, who topped the table for all but eleven weeks of the season. “It was a deserved title which shows that the team knows how to bounce back from a bad spell,” Luis Enrique said, referring to a blip which saw his side fall to three defeats in April. Despite the wealth of talent that the squad possesses, Luis Enrique was keen to praise the team’s grit over the course of the campaign: “The hard work of the team throughout the season must be praised”. “It is the competition which shows the real state of a team” and that “the title is very hard to win”, he concluded.

In their final home game of the season on Sunday, FC Barcelona treated the fans to an enthralling afternoon. With the team inching ever closer to wrapping up the 2015/16 La Liga title and facing cross-town rivals RCDEspanyol in a late-season derby  certified as a must-win  for both sides, the blaugrana eleven gave the Camp Nou crowd an hour and a half of total football. The defence swarmed, the passing was crisp, and the trident was lethal. The only thing standing between FCB and a new piece of hardware is next Saturday's tête-à-tête with Granada, who avoided relegation on Sunday with a rout of their own in a 4–1 thumping of Sevilla.

The Nikken Sekkei Studio (Japan) and the Pascual-Ausió architect firm (Catalonia) teamed up for the winning project for the New Camp Nou, which was presented to the media at the current stadium, in the presence of the first team. The New Camp Nou stadium will play on the current stadium´s signature overhanging roof, and it will hold itself to the highest standards of sustainability, utilising collected rainwater and solar power. To be concluded for the 2020/21 season, the New Camp Nou will have a capacity of 105,000, a growth which will allow members on the waitlist for seats to acquire tickets. The Les Corts neighbourhood in Barcelona provides the ideal backdrop for the new stadium, as it offers space for expansion, and since the additional buildings have been tailored to blend in with the surrounding area. 

Luis Enrique’s team made their intentions clear right from the kick-off. They wanted goals. And with four goals and three assists, Luis Suárez had a night that Barça fans will be remembering for years to come. the Urguayan now has 49 goals in 48 games this season for the blaugranes. After the win in Galicia, he was only happy to have helped the team: “The most important thing is that the goals have served to help achieve a vital win given that we were coming off the back of a bad run. We will keep trying to reach our objectives. I am sure that the work will pay off.” Rakitic, Barta, Messi and Neymar Jr did the rest. The 8-0 win over Deportivo sends out a warning message. They said there were five finals ahead, and the first has been won with flying colours. Barça are back with a vengeance.

Two goals from Antoine Griezmann send Atlético into the Champions League semi-finals and end Barça’s hopes of another treble. A first half header and a second half penalty from Antoine Griezmann cancelled out the Catalans’ 2-1 lead from the first leg, and it means that the dream of repeating the famous treble of 2014/15 is over. Messi ended a frustrating evening for Barça by sending the kick over the bar, and Atlético desperately clung on for the remaining minutes. Luis Enrique suffered his first knockout from a cup competition as Barça boss. Until then, the Asturian had a perfect record, taking Barça through to the next round of cup tournaments on 13 occasions. After suffering a disappointing exit from the Champions League just 12 hours earlier, the FC Barcelona players were back in training on Thursday morning focused on 'La Liga'

With a 2-1 advantage from the first leg, the Catalans are looking to seal qualification to their eighth Champions League semi-final in nine years. Barça go into the game on the back of a disappointing league defeat to Real Sociedad but last week’s win over Atlético gives them a boost going into tonight’s second leg. "We have a small advantage but the tie remains open and so we will try to win the match as always," said Luis Enrique speaking to the mediabin Madrid on Tuesday. Barca’s record against the side from the capital has been perfect since the appointment of Luis Enrique in the summer of 2014. Luis Suarez’s brace last week sealed a seventh straight win over Atlético under the Asturian.

FC Barcelona stayed true to their billing as a team endowed with a heaping dose of resilience, valiantly bouncing back from Saturday’s stinging home league defeat to emerge victorious on the very same pitch in a good old-fashioned Champions League thriller, with two goals from Luis Suárez. In the 25th minute, Fernando Torres fired from two paces right of the penalty spot through the legs of Ter Stegen for a 1–0 lead. It was Torres’s 11th goal in 15 career matches against FC Barcelona. It wasn’t until the 63rd minute when Luis Suárez redirected a deflected shot from the boot of Neymar Jr into the net to tie the match. The Camp Nou exploded, with an 88,534-strong chorus providing the soundtrack as the Catalans pushed even harder to take the lead. Luis Suárez's second half brace reversed early one-goal deficit in heart-stopping quarter-final opener and meant another victory for Barça.