It is official: Sant Andreu and Europa will no longer have to leave home

BarcelonaAfter a meeting held this Monday between the mayor of Barcelona, Jaume Collboni, and representatives of Sant Andreu and Europa, both Barcelona clubs have officially informed that the Barcelona council will undertake the necessary reforms in the coming weeks so that their first male teams can play next season in Primera RFEF in their stadiums, the Narcís Sala and the Nou Sardenya, respectively. It was a historic request from the two neighborhood clubs with the most following in the city that has finally come true a few days after Sant Andreu's promotion, which next season will coincide with Europa in the third state division. Neither of the two venues currently has natural grass, an indispensable condition to compete in Primera RFEF.

To adjust the playing fields to the regulations, both Sant Andreu and Europa will have to move their youth football to other artificial turf fields, which are much easier to maintain than natural grass. As for the andreuencs, they will have to relocate these teams to the AISS football field, in La Verneda, and also to Bon Pastor and Baró de Viver. For its part, Europa will transfer a significant part of its youth academy to the Llars Mundet field, which will be managed by the escapulado club after a readaptation process. In this way, the Nou Sardenya will be freed up to place natural grass there, with the added complication of the public car park located just below it. Europa celebrates the municipal measure after four months of its exile in the Can Dragó velodrome, a municipal facility that does have natural grass. The graciencs started the season in the Primera RFEF in their stadium, but they exhausted the moratorium from the governing bodies and had to find a way to play their home games in a provisional space.

The calendar starts to run

Now the key to all of this will lie in the deadlines. In Sant Andreu, they are confident that everything can be resolved before the start of next season. "The city council will process the tender through the urgent route so that it is ready as soon as possible. The mayor has also assured the club that the lighting [of the Narcís Sala] will reach the 600 luxes required by RFEF regulations," assures the quadribarrado club in its statement. "We needed a solution that guaranteed the sporting, social, and economic viability of the project [...] Now we are working on the calendar, both for the installation of the turf at Nou Sardenya and for the adaptation of Llars Mundet. In the coming weeks, the club will inform of all the details together with the Barcelona City Council," reports, for its part, Europa, which knows it can count on Can Dragó if the work takes longer than expected.