“WE WANT TO PROJECT BARCELONA AS a club with a heart,” Joan Laporta, the club’s president, said on the eve of signing a five-year accord with Unicef, the children’s charity. When the players run out tomorrow in their opening Champions League match against Levski Sofia, they will, for the first time in the club’s history, carry advertising on their shirts, but their sponsor, Unicef, will pay nothing for the privilege.

“After we won the Champions League (in May), we got an offer from a reputable firm that would have made ours the most highly-paid shirt in the world — €22 million (about £15 million) a year for five years,” Laporta, newly re-elected unopposed for a second three-year term, said. “So we had to decide between €110 million or receiving nothing except the opportunity to project the image of Barcelona internationally as something more than a football club, as an organisation with humanitarian values. It’s an intangible value, but the board of directors was unanimous in its decision.”

Cynics may scoff at this feel-good marketing ploy, but many of them are the same people who complain that money is ruining the game. It is hard not to admire a club who turn down an offer superior to that enjoyed by either Real Madrid or Bayern Munich in exchange for the “intangible value” of being associated with aid programmes designed to help the world’s most disadvantaged children.

“We guarantee that we will donate a minimum of €1.5 million a year for these programmes to help children and, in exchange, we have the right to put the Unicef logo on our shirt for up to five years,” Laporta said, adding that initially they are committed to sporting the logo for one season.

“We hope that businesses will also support the foundation in this work and that we can maximise the image of the club as a humanitarian organisation through the belief that through football it is possible to transform society and that Barça is, by its nature, well placed to help bring about social change.”

Laporta, 44, is a lawyer whose ready smile and matinée idol looks belie the toughness required to achieve what he has over the past three years. He has turned around the fortunes of a debt-laden club who had not won a thing in four seasons. Since Laporta and his team took over, Barcelona have won two league titles and lifted the European Cup and are on course to becoming the richest club on earth.

Barcelona’s boast that it is “more than a club” rang hollow during the recent barren years, but Laporta insists that this vision transcends the business of winning trophies. “To say that it is more than a club is to recognise that it aspires to something more than sporting success,” he said. “It represents the Catalan nation and in so doing embodies the civic, moral and democratic values of Catalunya, an open and inclusive society.

“In the context of the Spanish state, Barça has always symbolised progressive, democratic values and the defence of human rights, above all during an era when democratic rights were suppressed.”

The delicate question of shirt sponsorship was on the table from the day Laporta took over as president. Barely a year ago, the club were on the brink of signing a five-year deal with China to promote the 2008 Olympic Games, but the move was controversial, given the country’s human rights record, and was condemned by Amnesty International.

The next suitor was betandwin, an online betting concern, but many inside the club were uncomfortable about promoting gambling.

“When we took over in 2003, the club was in financial difficulties and we took soundings on having advertising on the shirt for the first time in our history. We are the only professional club that doesn’t,” Laporta said.

“In all our discussions we were agreed about two things: that the sponsor must be prestigious and that the sponsor would pay more than was paid to any other club. The first season we got offers of €8-12 million; the next season we won the league and we were offered €14 million. But we were always looking for something different, and that’s what interested us about China, about promoting Olympic values. The best option is the one we have arrived at, or at least that’s what we hope.”

Laporta concedes that they can afford to make the Unicef gesture thanks to the club’s much improved financial health. “We had to take some unpopular decisions. In the first year we cut outgoings by 18 per cent and increased income by 38 per cent — in terms of running a football club, this is a revolution. And in three years we have doubled our income. In 2009-10 we expect income to be €400 million and within the next three years we hope to reduce the deficit to zero. We are enjoying some of the best times in our history. The fans see that we have done what we have said we’d do.”

However, Laporta has made it clear that the club are leaving their sponsorship options open and some fans fear that the Unicef deal has partly been struck to soften them up to accept a commercial sponsor.

THE ELEPHANT MAN

IN THE LATE 1990s, JOAN LAPORTA LED the “Blue Elephant” group opposing a former Barcelona president. He stood himself and unexpectedly won the presidency in June 2003, promising to return the club to greatness, restore the influence of the 100,000 “member” fans — and sign David Beckham. The 44-year-old lawyer certainly achieved the first part, although the initial months of his reign were difficult as the team struggled and the club endured financial problems.

This year, he criticised English clubs for raiding the continent for young talent. He was re-elected in August after no other candidate achieved enough signatures from members to be allowed to run against him.

UNITED EXPORTS RUN WILD

EVEN A MISSED PENALTY COULD NOT take the shine off Rudd van Nistelrooy’s starring role for Real Madrid last night. The former Manchester United forward claimed a hat-trick as Real beat Levante 4-1.

Van Nistelrooy opened the scoring for the visiting side before a 40-yard pass from David Beckham dropped at Antonio Cassano’s feet in the penalty area, allowing the Italian to make it 2-0. Levante pulled a goal back before half-time but Real’s third was a goal made in England. José Antonio Reyes, formerly of Arsenal, played the ball into the centre, Beckham headed across goal and Van Nistelrooy scored.

The Dutchman was later pulled down in the area but missed the penalty, before scoring a third in the dying minutes.

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