Joan Laporta has hinted at running for Barcelona President in the future, before criticising the current regime once more for ‘destroying’ the club.
Laporta served from 2003 to 2010, before being replaced by former Vice-President and supporter Sandro Rosell, who he has since been critical of.
With Rosell confirming his intention to stand for re-election in 2016, Laporta was today asked if he would also consider coming in for the vote.
“Sometimes I come to think seriously about the possibility of re-introducing myself when there are elections, but I have not yet decided. I have to value this at a family and professional level,” reflected the 50-year-old lawyer by profession, before taking the chance to have another dig at Rosell.
“His first decision was to remove Johan Cruyff as honorary President and then sue me and my fellow directors for €47m for failing to manage Barca well.
“When players claim such things [as Gerard Pique did this week], it is because there has been a passivity, things that have not been done, decisions that have not been taken or worked.
“They have engaged in destroying the things we did with great effort and hard work. Consciously, in a spirit of revenge, resentment.
“I worry that there are people so twisted and without gratitude are allowed to dedicate themselves to destroying the best club in history’s reputation and legacy.”
One such decision Laporta used as an example was replacing Pep Guardiola with Tito Vilanova.
“He was named as a solution out of the anxiety caused in looking for Pep’s successor. They were in a hurry.
“Tito is a good Coach with great knowledge, a great student of Pep, but he needed to have a period of adaptation prior to do what he is doing now.
“And then he had the great misfortune to fall ill again.
“Temporarily replacing him during treatment for cancer with Jordi Roura? It’s hard to make a decision, but you have to take it.
“What surprised me was that a more forceful decision was not taken in the key moment of the season when we were in the Champions League, whilst protecting the economic interests of Tito.
“Tito, to reassure him, should have secured his contract and waited for a full recovery, because it would have been difficult for him to lead the club in his situation.
“We had to say, ‘Tito, you recover absolutely, you relax, do not suffer for nothing.
“‘We will respect the contract with you, but we will incorporate a professional that we believe is prepared to handle this situation until the end of the season’.”
