Copa Del Ray: Athletic Club knocks Barcelona out to reach semis
It was another disappointment for Barcelona, as the club was expecting to go to the Copa del Rey semifinals for the second straight season.
La Liga giants Barcelona find themselves in deep crisis as six high-profile board members resigned from their respective positions after complaining about the way the club was run.
Vice presidents Emili Rousand and Enrique Tombas, alongside directors Silvio Elias, Maria Teixidor, Josep Pont and Jordi Clasamiglia have informed club president Josep Maria Bartomeu about their decision to quit via a joint letter.
The letter, which used some strong words to describe the club’s current condition, urged the president to review the club leadership as soon as possible in order to overcome the challenges presented by the ongoing global crisis due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
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“We hereby want to communicate that the undersigned managers have transferred to President Bartomeu our decision to irrevocably resign from our position as managers of FC Barcelona,” Goal.com quoted the group’s letter read via La Vanguardia.
“We have reached this point by not being able to reverse the criteria and forms of management of the club in the face of the important challenges of the future and, especially, from the new post-pandemic scenario.
“As a last service to our club, we recommend that as soon as circumstances allow it to convene new elections that allow, with all the ‘authority’, to manage the club in the best possible way in the face of the important challenges of the immediate future,” the letter added.
The resignations come after a months-long tussle between Bartomeu and his opposite lobby has already put the club in an internal turmoil ahead of the next summer’s board elections.
That everything was not right in Barcelona was evident by the number of occasions the club president’s role was put under the scanner this season. Men’s football team skipper Lionel Messi has also expressed his grief over the team run by Bartomeu.
According to an ESPN report, the president only wanted “people he can trust” in the board in his final year and had personally called four of the six members who resigned – Rousaud, Tombas, Elias and Pont – to step down.
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