Futbolo forumas

Barcelona are going to leave the Camp Nou again.

This was already part of their plans to finish ongoing rebuilding works at their iconic ground, but now we know — following comments from vice-president Ferran Olive at Saturday’s annual general assembly — exactly what they expect to happen next.

Olive said Barca would finish this 2026-27 season at the Camp Nou, but would then have to play away from the stadium for around half of 2027-28. He said the club hoped to come back in January 2028.

At that meeting, Barcelona also requested club members approve another big loan — taking on €510million (£437m; $584m) in further debt, €300m being earmarked for Camp Nou construction and €210m in further operational borrowings — in order to complete the works. This was voted through, meaning Barcelona’s total debts are now set to surge well past €2billion and could hit €2.6bn in total, depending on repayment dates.

It takes the budget for the Espai Barca project, which encompasses the Camp Nou rebuild, to €1.8billion, or triple what the works were costed at when it was first pitched in 2014. And even that sum won’t cover the full project; president Joan Laporta told club members on Saturday the extra €300m earmarked for the Camp Nou will not cover the building of the Palau Blaugrana, a venue which will house the club’s non-football teams.

But to fit the roof and finish the stadium completely, the team will need to leave. Design plans mean the roof has to be built from inside the stadium, requiring building materials to be stationed where the Camp Nou pitch is.

Olive also said: “When we get back to the Camp Nou in January 2008, we expect to have a 95,000 seating capacity which will give us again this full potential to get the financial side of the club working at its best.”

From this, it sounds like the ground will still not quite be fully finished when Barca do go back. The total capacity of the new Camp Nou is planned to reach 105,000, up from the previous official total of 99,354. That was already the largest of any European football venue.

Now Barcelona expect to have the stadium finished and at full capacity by the start of the 2028-2029 season. Last week, UEFA announced it has chosen the Camp Nou as the 2029 Champions League final venue, set for June 2 that year.

Add that €1.8billion in maximum Espai Barca funding to the operational debt and the club’s overall borrowings could top €2.6bn. And that doesn’t include the 25 per cent of La Liga TV revenues sold off to Sixth Street, a private equity firm, in 2022, nor how the Palau Blaugrana arena, the new home of Barca’s non-football teams, will now be funded. When the Espai budget was last revised, in 2021, the cost of Palau Blaugrana and its surroundings was mooted at €420m.