Joan Laporta

Joan Laporta Estruch (born 29 June 1962) is a Catalan politician and current president of FC Barcelona.

Laporta is a lawyer (he graduated from the University of Barcelona) with his own firm, Laporta & Arbós, which has a number of notable Catalan firms as clients.

Laporta started his involvement with FC Barcelona leading the "Elefant Blau" ("Blue Elephant"), a group which opposed former president Josep Lluís Núñez and which, in 1998, tried unsuccessfully a vote of no confidence against him.

The club situation was one of bitter unhappiness and disappointment amongst both fans and players after the club failed to meet their own standards to match Real Madrid's success in the early 2000s, having not won trophies since 1999.

With Laporta's arrival, and that of football superstar Ronaldinho (his star signing after David Beckham's decision to go to Real Madrid, and Thierry Henry who decided to remain at Arsenal) as well as new manager Frank Rijkaard, among others, the club was forced to embark on a new phase, having elected a new, young and largely untested managerial board along with him.

Laporta also decided to fight against the threat of violence outside the Camp Nou stadium, specially from the Boixos Nois (Mad Boys) ultras gang, and faced insults and death threats from them.

Police investigation revealed they had planned to kidnap him.

In the 2003 elections, Laporta did not start as the favourite, but his charisma grew during the electoral campaign and he finally won against the expected victor, publicist Lluís Bassat, in part because of a widely published (and ultimately unfulfilled) promise to bring David Beckham to Barcelona.

Laporta had the support of other young businessmen of Barcelona, such as Sandro Rosell.

Laporta quickly became a media star, even more than some of the players.

Laporta's first season (2003–04) as president would prove to be a watershed for the club, but not without initial instability.

To exacerbate the situation, the 2003–04 season began abysmally results-wise, with Laporta constantly having to call for the fans' understanding and patience with him and Rijkaard as the club slowly phased out underachieving players from the old guard in order to rebuild a new-look side around Ronaldinho.

Laporta also had to spur his board to foster creative business ideas to raise revenue, and in recent years, that new style of management eventually succeeded in turning around the fortunes of the club with the team spectacularly returning to form and finishing second after being at the bottom of the table in 2003–04, and then finally managing to win La Liga titles both in 2004–05 and in 2005–06.

During this period, the inherited massive financial debt started to be cut down, and only two players remained from the original team that did not win a major title in six years, with players like Deco, Samuel Eto'o and Edmílson as the new starlets, around Ronaldinho and a core of home-grown players like Carles Puyol, Xavi, Andrés Iniesta, Víctor Valdés and Oleguer.

The club finally won the UEFA Champions League on 17 May 2006, only their second time in history, as well as that year's Liga championship.

Barcelona had a long history of avoiding shirt sponsors.

In 2006, FC Barcelona announced a five-year agreement with UNICEF, where the club would donate €1.5 million and the UNICEF logo would feature on their shirts.

After Laporta left as president, the club signed shirt sponsorships with Qatar Foundation and later Qatar Airways, which he criticised.

There was some discussion about when exactly Laporta's mandate started, with the board of directors holding one opinion and the opposition another.

One club member went to the court and, on 19 July 2006, a judge ruled that the first eight days of his presidency in June 2003 counted as the first year of his four-year term; his term had therefore expired and new elections were called.

Temporarily, the club was ruled by a management committee led by the economist Xavier Sala-i-Martin.

The elections were to be held on 3 September 2006, but they turned out to be unnecessary as on 22 August, Barcelona confirmed Laporta's presidency for another four years after no other would-be candidate received the 1,804 signatures required to stand for the elections

The poor results of the sports sections, especially in football, together with concerns about his leadership style, resulted in a censure motion which took place on 6 July 2008 and was led by Oriol Giralt.

Exit polls showed that 60.60% of the 39,389 votes cast were against Laporta.

Even though he lost the overall vote, however, the necessary 66% to hold new elections was not reached.

Following the results, it was speculated that Laporta would resign due to pressure from fellow directors.

This would have resulted in then vice-president Albert Vicens taking over for Laporta, with Ferran Soriano replacing Vicens as the main vice-president.

These rumours, however, were quickly dismissed by Laporta.

On 10 July 2008, 8 of the 17 board members – vice-presidents Albert Vicens, Ferran Soriano and Marc Ingla, and directors Evarist Murtra, Toni Rovira, Xavier Cambra, Clàudia Vives-Fierro and Josep Lluís Vilaseca – resigned following Laporta's confirmation that he will stay on as president of the club despite the opinion of the members.

In a press statement, they revealed that they resigned due to "discrepancies in the way to act after the result of the motion".

After dismissing Barcelona head coach Frank Rijkaard, Laporta appointed the untested and inexperienced Pep Guardiola, Barça's team captain at the end of the "Dream Team" era.

Guardiola's only experience as a coach was with the B team the previous season (which won promotion from the fourth tier to the third).

Although the team started poorly, losing the first match to Numancia and drawing the second, Barcelona had the best season in its history, winning the treble of La Liga, the Copa del Rey and the Champions League.

Supercopa de España and UEFA Super Cup titles followed in August, as well as a FIFA Club World Cup victory in December.

During his first tenure as president of FC Barcelona, they set a new record for trophies won in a 12-month period, winning 6 in 2009.

He served as MP in the Parliament of Catalonia between 2010 and 2012.

After departing in 2010, he was re-elected as club president in 2021.

During Laporta's reign as club president the sports sections of FC Barcelona have won over 92 official trophies as of 2023.

He was succeeded by Sandro Rosell in 2010.

In November 2020, Laporta announced president candidacy for the 2021 FC Barcelona presidential elections.