Barça: 36 months of anomaly

BarcelonaThe resignation of Ferran Reverter as CEO of Barça three years ago transformed the way the Barcelona club was managed during Joan Laporta's second term. Not only because of the resignation of the Catalan executive, who had a vision of how the present and future should be faced that was quite far from that of the president, but above all because Laporta decided not to replace him and take on the functions of Reverter. Thus, the lawyer proclaimed himself executive president and began to manage the Barcelona entity "like a family business," as he himself said. Right now there is only one other major European club that does not have a CEO, Inter Milan, and two other Spanish clubs in the First Division that also do not have one, Rayo Vallecano and Valencia. Unlike Barça, all three are public limited companies and not an association with a board of directors made up of honorary officials who do not receive a fee for serving.

The decision not to replace Reverter has been repeatedly criticized for the opposition to Laporta and by a part of the Barça social mass. But this pressure has not made the president back down. On the contrary. The positions of economic vice president and marketing vice president remain vacant despite the fact that Eduard Romeu resigned from the first in March 2024 and Juli Guiu left the second in January 2025.

The vast majority of big European football clubs have a CEO or general manager below the president. Real Madrid, Atlético de Madrid, Bayern Munich, Liverpool, Paris Saint-Germain, Juventus Turin, Manchester City, Bayer Leverkusen, Ajax Amsterdam, Borussia Dortmund, Chelsea, PSV Eindhoven, Milan, Manchester United and Feyenoord all have this figure, common in any big company. Only Inter Milan is without one, which had one until February 3, when Alessandro Antonello packed his bags to take on the same role at Roma. For the moment, the person in charge of replacing him has been the president of the Italian club, Giuseppe Marotta.

Among the general managers of these clubs, two big names stand out who were part of Barça in the recent past. Catalan Ferran Soriano, economic vice-president during Laporta's first term, has been the CEO of Pep Guardiola's Manchester City since 2012. Another old acquaintance is Omar Berrada, the CEO of Manchester United. Berrada was responsible for sponsorship at Barça and director of commercial development between 2004 and 2011. After a period at City as director of operations of the City Football Group, he joined the city rivals in 2024 to act as CEO.

Another notable case is that of Bayern Munich, whose ownership model has sometimes been held up as an example of what Barça could become in the future. The Bavarian club is 75% owned by its members and 25% by three multinationals from the region: Adidas, Audi and Allianz. The current president of Bayern is Herbert Hainer, who has a CEO, Jan-Christian Dreesen.

A 'rara avis' in Spain too

In the Spanish Primera División, 17 of the 20 teams have a CEO or general manager. One of them is Real Madrid, which has José Ángel Sánchez (colloquially known as JAS) playing this role since 2006. The same goes for the other two clubs that, apart from the Blaugrana, are sports associations: Athletic Club and Osasuna. The three exceptions are Barça and two sports corporations: Rayo Vallecano and Valencia.

The Vallecas entity had it until 2022, when the president Raúl Martín Presa decided to dismiss Luis Yáñez and also give him the functions of general director. The same year, Valencia appointed Layhoon Chan as president and, at the same time, gave him general management and strategic direction. As they are sports corporations, Martín Presa and Chan are paid for carrying out tasks in their respective clubs. Laporta, on the other hand, cannot receive any salary for being president of Barça. The statutes of the entity prevent this.

The general managers