The eternal exile of the neighborhood club that does not play in its neighborhood

BarcelonaGrassroots football is a boom in Barcelona. For some time now, young people in the capital have been gravitating towards their neighbourhood clubs, which have become an integral part of their social fabric. This is evident in Vila de Gràcia (Europa), Sant Andreu de Palomar (UE Sant Andreu), or la Verneda i la Pau (Júpiter). In Sants, where another historic team like Unió Esportiva Sants plays, this phenomenon is not reproduced. In fact, the club is increasingly emotionally and geographically distant from the neighbourhood and its fans, and this is explained by the fact that for decades it has not had a home, a stadium to call its own.“We are a neighborhood club that does not play in its neighborhood. The team was born and grew around the historic center of Sants, but for many years it has competed far from there”, says Artur Balaux, a lifelong Sants fan and curator of the entity’s historical memory. Currently, the first team plays its home games at Camp de la Bàscula and the youth football is spread across this same pitch, l’Energia’s, and l’Ibèria’s. All of them are located in the Marina de Port neighborhood, next to the Zona Franca.“Many times they ask me: «How is it that Sants doesn’t play in Sants»? And I answer them: «It’s because we don’t have a field». We are exiles from our home and increasingly uprooted from the neighborhood”, comments Joan Forcadell, president of the entity. “The chain of transmission from fathers to sons and from grandfathers to grandsons has been broken, and of course, we have lost a lot of fans”, confirms Balaux, who is member number 18. The social decline has been accompanied by a large expense in rents – the lease of the three fields represents around 25% of the club’s annual budget – and it has been reflected on the pitch: the first team went from Tercera RFEF to Primera Catalana, two categories below, in two years, and currently occupies a relegation spot in Segona Catalana. In 2023, Sants was a rival of Europa and Sant Andreu; as things stand, everything suggests that next season it will be five divisions below.

The nomadic team from Barcelona

Sants, a founding member of the Volta Ciclista a Catalunya –the leader's jersey is white with green stripes, like the football team's shirt–, is a centenary club founded in 1922 from the merger of four different sports entities and which has been on the verge of promotion to the Second Division several times. Until 1964 it played at the stadium on Galileu street, which it had to abandon by decree of the Barcelona City Council due to the construction of Madrid Avenue. Then, it became a wandering club. It emigrated to Sarrià, until Kubala and Di Stéfano, from Espanyol, complained that their morning matches were damaging the grass; it also went through Hospitalet, the old Sardenya – the former Europa stadium – and the facilities of FC Barcelona.

With the club's survival hanging by a thread and thanks to the drive of Vicenç Febrer –an illustrious Sants resident who was a councillor in the Barcelona City Council, a boxer, Spanish freestyle wrestling champion, and who ran a renowned car shop with a lion in the window–, Sants moved in 1975 to Julià de Capmany's ground, which was built in the Safont quarry, on an old landfill in the Polvorí de Montjuïc neighbourhood. Disagreements with neighbours and the Polvoritense leaders caused a new exodus, and in 1984 the club inaugurated the Camp de la Magòria, where a railway station had once been.a lion in the window–, Sants moved in 1975 to Julià de Capmany's ground, which was built in the Safont quarry, on an old landfill in the Polvorí de Montjuïc neighbourhood. Disagreements with neighbours and the Polvoritense leaders caused a new exodus, and in 1984 the club inaugurated the Camp de la Magòria, where a railway station had once been.The return home

La Magòria was an ideal place to put down roots, a move to a dignified location very close to the heart of the neighborhood that seemed definitive. But, 25 years later, Sants was again evicted from its home by the City Council, which had bought the land from the Generalitat during the crisis and had plans to reform the area. Since then, its diaspora continues: throughout its history, it has had premises in nine different grounds. “In 2009 they told us that in four or five years we could return to La Magòria... and we are still going around. Well, in fact, since 1964 we have been going up and down,” complains Forcadell, who is convinced that when Sants finally settles in La Magòria, which is its desire, it will regain a good part of the prestige and social mass it has been losing."The construction project is approved and what we know is that it should start in 2027, but we don't have a firm date to play at La Magòria again. Besides the football pitch, the complex will include many other facilities. It is a large-scale project with a very high budget; I hope that the different municipal governments maintain their confidence in the project," concludes Joan Forcadell, the president of UE Sants, the eternal wanderer of Barcelona football.