Culers Talking: Former director Maria Teixidor on why club must stick to its values and follow the example of Barcelona Femeni

Like many Barcelona fans who grew up in Catalunya, Maria Teixidor became a culer the day she was born.

Enchanted by trips to the Camp Nou with her father, surrounded by a community of socios with a stake in not only the success of the team, but also in maintaining what they believed it stood for.

Through the years, the good times and the bad, the support remained firm, because FC Barcelona was more than a football team. It was an institution with values that represented the people who filled the stands.

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Values is a word Maria kept coming back to. Even though the political and social context in Spain, and the world at large, has changed over the decades, the values that Barcelona stands for are universal. And could be used as a compass to navigate the uncertain future.

As Maria reminds us, Barcelona’s identity was formed by the history it lived through.

From the capture and execution of its president, Josep Sunyol, by fascists during the Spanish Civil War, the principles of courage and justice were etched into the fabric of the club.

While Real Madrid’s fortune skyrocketed during the reign of Francisco Franco in the decades that followed, Barcelona became a symbol of resistance.

For the earliest socios, who were mainly Catalan, their identity was reflected in FC Barcelona.

But as the world got smaller, many people across the globe saw a team whose values resonated with them too.

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When Maria Teixidor became a member of the Board of Directors in 2015, a new chapter began for the club that was much more than that, as she spearheaded an effort to create an environment where women could thrive too.

In just a few years, Barca Femení revolutionized the game on the women’s side, continuing the legacy of beautiful football that Barcelona has always stood for.

In our conversation, Maria describes the experience of creating the conditions for women to succeed from the inside of FC Barcelona during her time on the board.

And she explains how the success of the women was an expression of the club leading with its values.

And that’s an important point to remember with a new season on the horizon.

Maria Teixidor i Jufresa: Former member of the FC Barcelona Board of Directors

On where her love for the club comes from

MT: I was born in Barcelona, and I have lived here since I was born. Got married here, and my kids were also born here.

I was a Barca fan ever since I was born. You really live this passion with your family. I used to go to the football matches with my father when I was a kid. So that’s where it all began, at home and cheering the team every weekend when there was a match in the Camp Nou.

Favorite early FC Barcelona memory

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MT: I belong to the generation that lived through the dream team and Johan Cruyff as a coach, and the generation of players like Pep Guardiola, Laudrup, Bakero, Koeman, all these players that brought us to our first Champions League title.

The cup that we won in 1992, that was the turning point of becoming a very big club worldwide. So ‘92 is very much in my mind and in my thoughts when I think about the club. I remember the celebrations. I went with my friends to Canaletas where you celebrate the victories, and the whole ambience in the city was awesome.

And of course I have smaller memories about being at the stadium with the crowd. This thing that you look forward to every week when you know that there will be a match, because it’s a family moment, a moment you spend with your father. Something to enjoy together.

How has Barcelona changed over the decades?

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MT: It has changed, because I think the whole football industry has changed, and it’s happened to all big clubs worldwide.

We used to be a club for the members, where you met everyone at the game. Now you see it’s an attraction where you have many more visitors from around the globe who are not members. Tourists who come to see a match.

This didn’t happen so much when I was a kid. So this is a great way to measure the impact outside of the borders of our city. The club going from being a Catalunya thing, to being something international that appeals to people from other places in the world, that they feel linked to.

How did Barcelona expand its reach globally so quickly?

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MT: I think Barcelona has some values that are really universal. It’s a combination of being a sports club that has won a lot, and of course you always want to be with the winners, so this expands your brand globally.

But also because the club has made an effort globally to expand its social activity to help kids, in refugee camps, and places abroad where there is a need where we could spread our values.

But of course it goes together with globalization. The fact that you have sponsors like Nike that helped you reach the whole world, so you can travel the world, and everyone knows the players, and you can really feel it, that Barcelona is their own.

How would you describe the values of the club?

MT: It may have started as a political thing, but it’s a concept that is permanently under revision, and we are evolving.

For example, we are the ones who professionalized women’s football. And for me, as a woman, and someone who was in charge of the women’s team, being more than a club at that time meant being at the forefront of what was happening in the world. Fighting for a world that is more equal. That gives opportunities to women and empowers them. Built on an idea of equality.

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In that moment, more than a club meant taking on our shoulders the responsibility of bringing the sport to the next level, and the next level was equality in sports for everyone.

So if we think about values as being foundational principles of the club, we know they are something that evolves with the context of where we are at each point in history.

On the balancing values with economic considerations

MT: That’s a big issue. A big question.

When you talk about Barca, and what it has meant, it’s about the history of the club since it was founded, which was by a Swiss guy in Barcelona. So it was always very open to the world.

It was also a counterbalance to the dictatorship in Spain. The history of the club is linked to what has happened in the country in the last century.

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And then you add to the political history the sporting history of the club. A club that is becoming a winner. That is attracting sponsors. But still, as you grow, you do it in a way that is founded in the values of the people that are the owners of the club. Your socios.

It’s a mix of things. When you talk about sticking to those values, I think this is something we’re having a hard time with because the world is so different now than when it started. You are always thinking about how to stick to that. We are more than a club. We are the club that has values. We are the ones who should do things differently.

How did the Barca Femení team become so successful so quickly?

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MT: Maybe the women’s team is an example of what it means to believe in Barca as a values based club.

For me it was an honor to become a member of the board, and that President Bartomeu wanted me for his team when he ran for the 2015 election. I was a fan ever since I was born. Being able to give my time and vision to the club was really exciting, and doing so at a time where the idea was to professionalize the women’s team was incredible, because I’ve always fought for women’s rights as a lawyer.

I’ve struggled with this in my own work life, so it felt like a personal and a collective thing, where suddenly you’re in a wonderful place that has the means, the brand, and the name to make change in women’s history.

I felt the responsibility to be the voice of women on the board of directors at Barca. There were only two women there when we began.

Photo credit should read JOSEP LAGO/AFP via Getty Images

There are 150,000 socios, and 30% of those are women. So even if mainly men are football followers, there are also a lot of women that are active members and followers. But even though this was the reality, we didn’t have at that time a women’s team to follow.

So it was a beautiful moment where we could connect all the dots that we were doing in terms of the historical memory of women linked to Barcelona.

This work gave us an idea of what women linked to the club were doing over the century. It was very much about how such an important club navigated issues like equality throughout its history.

So we had lots of meetings with the club and with its members, and we made wonderful connections with women workers of the club, women fans from the Penyas, and professional women from civil society. And all this mix allowed us to bring attention to the women’s team, and what was happening with this project.

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I truly believe that the fact of taking the women’s team seriously as a sports project, and not as a nice to have, but as a real objective of the club to make them grow, was an essential part of the whole project.

For example, we made the pitch where they play called the Johan Cruyff stadium that is also used by the second team, and it is a place that is very magical for the women’s team, because it’s their own home. It has changing rooms only for women. It has become a stadium that they feel is their own, and it allowed us to build a community around the women’s team, so there could be a strong connection with all the fans.

On the state of the club today and its response to the Luis Rubiales scandal

MT: There’s a lot to say. (she said with a laugh).

I, along with many culers, am worried about the current situation in economic terms, and what is the future for our model of ownership.

I’m not sure of the future of the project. There have been some decisions that I don’t agree with.

For example, taking women’s football outside of the football structure and putting it in with the other sports like handball and basketball in terms of management. Which is the idea of giving them less importance at the club. I’m not happy with with that decision.

And the situation with the kiss of Luis Rubiales after the World Cup final. Barca’s response came late, it came decaffeinated. It came with no express condemnation of the behavior of the President of the National Federation.

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Lots of people and lots of supporters felt it was not in the spirit and in the idea of the values that Barca defends that are at the core of the institution. To have such, you know, a non-existent voice in a conversation that was mainstream in in Spain for the whole summer.

So in terms of women and Barca, I feel that we’ve gone some steps backwards, even if the success of the women’s team is huge, and to be celebrated. I think that we’ve lost an opportunity to be the voice of women’s sports in general.

Are you optimistic about the future at Barcelona?

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MT: We are a particular club in terms of ownership, because we are an association.

So the fact of maintaining the club in the hands of the members of the socios I think, is a constitutional part of who we are. So if we lose that part, which I think is at risk currently, because of the enormous debt that we have as a club, what will the club look like in the years to come?

There needs to be a sustainable model if we are to keep our ownership structure. So you really need to be very careful with all the money that goes into the club, and that is later used.