By Paul Kelso 6:02PM GMT 10 Dec 2010telegraph.co.uk
Barcelona sell shirt sponsorship for the first time as Qatar Foundation pay £125m to share space with Unicef.
Barcelona have ended their 111 year-tradition of not having a shirt sponsor, signing a world-record £125 million deal with the Qatar. Foundation that raises fresh questions about the emirate’s successful 2022 World Cup campaign.
The Qatar Foundation is a not-for-profit trust funded by Qatar’s ruling Al-Thani family that specialises in education projects, and their involvement with Barcelona was confirmed just eight days after country controversially won the right to stage the 2022 World Cup.
The £25m a-year deal is the highest of its kind in football, eclipsing Bayern Munich’s £23m deal with Deutsche Telekom and the £20m AON pay Manchester United.
"With this agreement, Barca have become the undisputed brand leader in world football, far ahead of international rivals," said vice-president Javier Faus.
Barcelona have long-maintained that they would not strike a commercial sponsorship deal for their shirts, though for the last five years they have worn the Unicef logo.
The Qatar Foundation will now share the shirt-fronts with the UN agency from next season, but their involvement has stirred concerns over the manner in which the emirate secured victory in the World Cup campaign.
Barcelona president Sandro Rosell, who negotiated the Qatar deal, has close ties to the emirate and is widely believed to have played a key role in building support for their 2022 bid in Europe and South America.
Qatar’s comprehensive victory is widely acknowledged to have been achieved in part thanks to a vote-trading deal with the Spain-Portugal 2018 bid.
Rival bids including England all believe the deal was struck, and Fifa’s ethics committee launched an investigation but did not bring any charges because there was insufficient evidence to do so.
Rosell has long-established links with Qatar, primarily through his financial stake in the Aspire Football Dreams academy that scouts young footballers around the world and brings them to the Gulf to develop.
Rosell helped establish the academy through his sports marketing agency Bonus Sports Marketing. Coach Pep Guardiola, who spent two seasons playing in the Gulf, was also a Qatar 2022 ambassador.
The deal comes with Barcelona facing acute financial pressure because of spiralling wage costs. Rosell was elected this summer promising to bring discipline to the club’s finances, and authorised an emergency loan of 150m euros in the summer. The club forecast a 90m euro loss despite winning the quadruple.
Meanwhile Uefa president Michel Platini added his voice to those pressing for the 2022 World Cup to be moved to winter because of the health dangers of playing in Qatar’s 45C summer temperatures.
“"It's true that if we talk about the World Cup in the Gulf in January, that would be easier than to play in June," Platini said. "On that I agree, and why not? It's possible."
Meanwhile Fifa ex-co member Chuck Blazer has said he did not vote for England because he did not see a legacy from staging the World Cup here.
"I voted for Russia," Blazer told Soccer America. "England clearly had a great bid. But in the end, I look at England and say, 'What more would we have when we're finished other than what I am certain would have been a great World Cup?'
“I believe that when we're finished in Russia, we'll have accomplished a lot of different things. We can open up a market that is important from a world perspective.”
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