BarcelonaThe elimination of Barça in the group stage of the Champions League, for the second time in a row, is a difficult trance to swallow. The Camp Nou experienced another European defeat this Wednesday, a night to forget. The fans arrived in their seats with elimination complete, after Inter Milan’s victory against Viktoria Plzen, and amid an atmosphere of disappointment, anger and resignation. “The vibe of the stadium against Bayern was that of 2002. It was all gray, apathetic, sad… defeated before we started. We’re not up to it and people know it,” confesses Marc Duch, president of Manifest Blaugrana Breathing was voracious in the culer temple. But, if we only heard the audio from that night at Camp Nou, the reality would seem quite different.
If we put aside what happened on the field of play and turn our gaze to the stands, two realities can be seen. “Barça mostly has two types of fans: on the one hand, the tribunes born between 40 and 50, who are informed in a traditional way through conventional media and more or less behave traditionally. These, now, are covered by the new bleachers – cheering stands -, whose age usually does not exceed 30 years”, radiographs the historian Ángel Iturriaga. “Historically, the Barça member was a pessimistic and defeatist fan. All this over the years begins to change when the team starts to win, especially with Guardiola. The fans click,” argues Albert Yarza, one of the leaders of the Almogàvers, who has grown the most in the animation group since the arrival of Joan Laporta in the box office.
“It looks like a theater!” Who has never heard this expression about the culer temple? The Camp Nou has never been a stadium with a high volume. The chants, although they are always present, have never been one playlist in a loop during the 90 minutes. “Before there was a majority of people with an attitude rostrum. “Nano, lower the flag, I can’t see it!”, they said to me when I went to the countryside with my father in the 80s. The change of generations, even two, has made the tribunes they are less and less and it makes those of us who live football in our own way more of them. It has to be like this!” claims Yarza.
Against Bayern, the change was palmar. “Whatever the crowd wants to happen happens. The Camp Nou has been denatured, both for better and for worse. They decide how the stadium sounds and there is a clear misalignment between what happens on the pitch, what happens in the club and what the stands feel,” defines Duch. And, throughout the game, the stadium looked like a party while on the green it was more like a funeral. “The crowd is an uncritical crowd, it’s there to cheer and it’s not able to distinguish a good match from a bad one,” says Ángel Iturriaga.
From the stands, however, they totally reject this consideration. “Does anyone think we are happy with the result? Clearly not. When the 90 minutes are over and we leave the pitch, we all play coach and see what happened. But when they start, the game starts again and we go back to to be at the maximum,” claims Yarza. “We can be player number twelfth. When they go down, we go up. Nowadays it’s hard for players to have a sense of belonging, because of the way the world of football is, but if you welcome them well, you go in their face and you treat them well, they will respond well to you. They need a push. We, from the stands, help to channel the emotions of the partners. We are a spark for the rest of the field to encourage,” he adds. The drums didn’t stop resounding even when Barça conceded the second before the half-hour mark. While a quieter section of the stand put their hands to their heads in resignation, the stand remained standing, megaphone in hand.
There are too many ties and there are no scarves”
“It is worrying that the stadium has gone from being the Liceu to an uncritical place -sentence Iturriaga-. The Camp Nou and all the stadiums in the world are a mixture of lifelong fans and tourists. They go to the field once and want enjoy it, as is normal. If the stands cheer, they cheer. They have no sense of belonging or identification at the Camp Nou. In the end, they have little to do with the traditional fan. The member does not understand what has happened. It is very negative for Barça, and the club should study it. It does not benefit the club to have an uncritical mass in the north end.” The club did not want to make assessments.
But has he really disappeared from the Camp Nou stands? tribune? Rather than disappearing, it has transformed. “We understand by tribune that lifelong member of Barça who sees little beyond what happens on the pitch. Depending on what happens, and if he thinks that what he sees on the pitch is in line with what the team has spent, he takes out the handkerchief or not,” explains Duch. Now, however, there are no handkerchiefs to be seen . “The profile of a partner that today would kick out Xavi and put Mourinho in still exists. The tribune that he wanted to get rid of Rijkaard because he wanted more muscle or that he didn’t want Cruyff still exists! What has indeed disappeared is the way to express this disagreement: the handkerchiefs have disappeared and the way to express oneself is through social networks,” he adds. Yarza goes a step further: “The tribunes they are not dead, but there is a generational change. Before they predominated tribunes, those who understand football as a spectacle where they do not participate, where they are spectators. The relay is much more active and participative and is much more integrated into football.”
What is irrevocable is that the Camp Nou will never stop beating. One way or another. The transversality of the club is also part of “More than a club”. The truth is that, just as the team changes season after season, so do the fans. The cultural feeling passes from grandparents to parents, and from parents to children, and with this inevitable passage of time, the temperament of the crowd also changes. Football, Barcelona and society are constantly evolving, little by little and in small things. Camp Nou is no exception.
