Carles Puyol has recovered in time from the injury he received playing for Spain on Wednesday, and has been included in Barça’s 18-man squad for tomorrow evening’s match against Betis (kick off 8pm). Giovani dos Santos and Santi Ezquerro return to the squad after injury. Giovani hasn’t played since the Villarreal game on March 9th while Ezquerro last played in the Copa del Rey against Alcoyano at the start of January. The negative side is that Gabi Milito hasn’t recovered in time but hopefully he will be fine for Tuesday’s Champions League game at Schalke. Keep reading →

The Spanish Football Federation have dictated that Saturday’s match between Betis and Barça will take place in Atletico Madrid’s Vicente Calderon stadium. Betis had appealed against their stadium being closed after the Athletic Bilbao goalkeeper Armando was hit by a bottle two weeks ago, but the Appeals Committee today rejected their appeal and the Federation have told Betis that the game will now take place in Madrid. Keep reading →

Carles Puyol had to come off after 15 minutes with an ankle injury in Spain’s 1-0 win over Italy. The extent of the injury is not clear yet though it is not thought to be serious and he may be ok to play against Betis on Saturday. Andres Iniesta and Xavi Hernandez both completed the 90 minutes while Gianluca Zambrotta came on as a substitute for Italy in the 68th minute. Keep reading →

Gai Assulin came on for the last twelve minutes of Israel’s 1-0 victory over Chile and became the youngest player ever to represent Israel in a full international. Two weeks before his seventeenth birthday, Assulin has yet to play a league game for Barça’s first team but it seems that he has a bright future ahead of him.  

Bojan Krkic continued his excellent moment of form with a superb goal for Spain’s under-21 side against Kazakhstan. Bojan scored Spain’s third goal of a 5-0 victory with an overhead kick in the 32nd minute. Click here to see the goal

Barça have agreed to play a friendly match with Fiorentina in Florence on July 30th. The match is being held to honour the ex-president of Uefa Artemio Franchi who died in a traffic accident 25 years ago. Franchi was also president of the Italian Football Federation and vice-president of Fifa. The last time Barça played Fiorentina was back in 1999 in the Champions League group stage. Barça won 4-2 at Camp Nou and drew 3-3 in Italy.

Barça have taken the somewhat strange step of reserving two different hotels in two different cities for Saturday’s match against Betis. The situation arrives due to Betis announcing they plan to stage the game at their Ruiz Lopera stadium in Seville despite an order by the Real Federación Española de Fútbol to find another venue for the match. Keep reading →

Only 39% of Fcbnews readers have voted for Frank Rijkaard as the person they want to see as coach next season. The poll began on the 14th March and at the beginning Rijkaard had close to 50% support, but disappointing results against Almeria and Valencia have turned the fans against him with Jose Mourinho being the favourite to replace him. To allow a new poll in the sidebar, I have moved this poll here where it can be found under a new category called, surprisingly enough, polls. You may continue to vote for as long as you like.

The new poll is on different systems or formations. Thank you all for taking part in the vote.

Barça got a much needed boost to their confidence with a 4-1 win over Valladolid at Camp Nou this afternoon, but if truth be told they didn’t play much better than in the 2-2 draw at Almeria last week. With parts of the public intent on whistling the team at various points of the game it was a nervous performance from the team. Keep reading →

Barça’s under-11 team proved that at least one thing works at the club, and that is the youth scheme which continues to produce some fantastic players. In a tournament played in  San Pedro del Pinatar the boys restored some pride for Barça by beating Real Madrid 1-0 in the semi final and Valencia 1-0 in the final with a goal from tournament top scorer captain Carlos Aleña (Pictured above with the cup). Eidur Gudjohnsen’s son Sveinn formed part of the team. Keep reading →