FC Andorra

[RoystonFoote'snephew]

For the first time in their history FC Andorra are playing in the Segunda in Spain. Interestingly they are owned by Gérard Pique. I wonder what the position would be should they gain promotion to La Liga and Gérard Pique remains a player at Barcelona. 

[Mr X]

I've thought that as well. I've read about them and they bought promotion one year from the Spanish FA! 

[Monkeh]

I dontnknow if there are any rules against a player owning a team, I know you can't own 2 clubs in the same league, but to own one and play for another? Perhaps that's a loop hole that those in power need to close,

[cityal]

Consider the situation (unlikely ofc) that Andorra FC do get promoted...

 

At the end of next season Barcelona and Real Madrid are vying for the title

It is all level on points going in to the last games and the title will go to Real Madrid if they equal Barcelona's result unless there is a 12 goal swing in GD

Real have Villareal away as their final game

Barcelona are playing FC Andorra in Gerard Piqué's final game as a professional at the Nou Camp.....

 

[TRL]

Biggest Question, how can a club in Andorra play in spain? Surely thats not right, i guess the same could be said for Cardiff and Swsnsea but they are in some sort of Union. Does Andorra have some sort of principality status with Spain? Or some hook up with the Spanish FA? I am guessing so if they play in their lower leagues.

[Lanterne Rouge]

On 16/08/2022 at 23:05, TRL said:

Biggest Question, how can a club in Andorra play in spain? Surely thats not right, i guess the same could be said for Cardiff and Swsnsea but they are in some sort of Union. Does Andorra have some sort of principality status with Spain? Or some hook up with the Spanish FA? I am guessing so if they play in their lower leagues.

Monaco play in the French leagues so I guess it must be `legal`.

[phantom]

FC Andorra, which plays in Spain’s second-tier Segunda División, has been granted permission to build a new 6,000-capacity stadium on the site of the Prada de Moles sports facilities in Encamp.

The Commune of Encamp has awarded the club, which is owned by Barcelona player Gerard Piqué, the right to occupy the site. The project is expected to cost around €26m (£21.8m/$26.6m), with the Commune contributing €6m during the first phase.

Laura Mas, head of the Encamp council, said the proposal presented by FC Andorra calls for a stadium that will allow it to create a “benchmark” in the field of sport. The Commune said the stadium will deliver an indirect return of nearly €1m per year if FC Andorra is in the Segunda División and €1.7m if the club is promoted to the top division.

Permission has been granted on the condition that FC Andorra fulfils a series of requests within the next six months. FC Andorra will operate the Prada de Moles site for 35 years once the agreement has been finalised.

The proposal presented by FC Andorra includes several phases for the project. The first phase will include the construction of a training ground, which will be built at a cost of €900,000 on land adjacent to Prada de Moles.

The stadium itself would meet the requirements to play in the top-tier LaLiga, and FC Andorra plans to host other events at the venue to increase revenue.

FC Andorra will grant the Commune permission to use the stadium for 10 days a year. As part of the agreement, the Commune’s logo will also feature on the front of FC Andorra’s shirts for the next six seasons.

The club currently plays its home matches at the Estadi Nacional, home of the Andorran national team, and is about to embark on its first-ever season in the second tier of Spanish football

 

 

[RoystonFoote'snephew]

On 16/08/2022 at 17:57, Mr X said:

I've thought that as well. I've read about them and they bought promotion one year from the Spanish FA! 

They paid €452,022 to replace CF Reus Deportiu in Segunda B after they were relegated to the Tercel for non payment of their players. They are not the only club to have, advanced this way through the lower leagues in Spain. 

On 16/08/2022 at 23:05, TRL said:

Biggest Question, how can a club in Andorra play in spain? Surely thats not right, i guess the same could be said for Cardiff and Swsnsea but they are in some sort of Union. Does Andorra have some sort of principality status with Spain? Or some hook up with the Spanish FA? I am guessing so if they play in their lower leagues.

They are voluntarily affiliated to the Catalan Football Federation. 

[Mad Cyril]

2 hours ago, Lanterne Rouge said:

Monaco play in the French leagues so I guess it must be `legal`.

Liverpool play in the English Premier League. Weirdly, their supporters don't kick off about that despite claiming not to be English....

[Gosport_Red]

FC Andorra, based in Andorra la Vella have never played in the Andorran League. The club was founded 1942 and they have always played in the Spanish league system, because they are registered with the Royal Spanish Football Federation.

[GrahamC]

On 16/08/2022 at 23:05, TRL said:

Biggest Question, how can a club in Andorra play in spain? Surely thats not right, i guess the same could be said for Cardiff and Swsnsea but they are in some sort of Union. Does Andorra have some sort of principality status with Spain? Or some hook up with the Spanish FA? I am guessing so if they play in their lower leagues.

All Liechtenstein teams play in the Swiss league, it is the only European country without a national league of any standard.

FC Vaduz by far the best side (who play at the National stadium) are in the second division.

Liechtenstein has a cup, Vaduz very regularly win it & much like Wales used to, with the Welsh Cup, they qualify for Europe as a result.

[phantom]

Gerard Pique may be entering the twilight of his playing days at Barcelona, but his career as a club owner is really starting to take off.

FC Andorra were bought by Pique's Kosmos Holdings in 2019 as a fifth-tier club. Nearly four years later, they are in the second tier of Spanish football, La Liga 2.

After eight games they have 14 points and sit in sixth place, a play-off spot. Early days, but an extraordinary fourth promotion in five seasons - and a meeting with Pique's Barcelona - is not off the cards.

President Ferran Villaseca has extolled the "great potential" of FC Andorra. It is fair to say that is starting to be realised.

"We are very happy and excited by how we have performed in the last few years, it has been an astonishing accomplishment," Villaseca, speaking at the World Football Summit in Seville, tells BBC Sport.

"We have realised part of our dream, we have a very strong sporting department - we now need to have that in the youth teams, and the club itself, the club structure."

FC Andorra were founded in 1942 and joined the Spanish league system six years later, but had never played above the third tier until 2022-23.

Until December 2018, the club were drifting in the regional leagues. Then Kosmos took over, inspiring an immediate upturn in form. Andorra won the fifth-tier First Catalan Division in 2018-19 on the final day.

This was when their rich new owners really started to pay off. A spot in the third-tier Segunda B opened up as CF Reus Deportiu were relegated amid financial problems.

Andorra were able to pay to take Reus' club licence for nearly half a million Euros, assuming their place in the Spanish league pyramid and securing a highly unusual double promotion.

"We have also had some luck," admits Villaseca. "We pursued our luck, we were always aiming to be lucky."

'We have grown too fast!'

The speed of Andorra's rise has left Villaseca scrambling to ensure their infrastructure can keep pace with the on-pitch performance.

The most glaring example is the Estadi Nacional ground they share with Andorra's national football team. It has a capacity of 3,306 - smaller than all but one in the third tier of Spanish football, let alone the second.

A new 6,000-capacity, €26 million stadium is in the pipeline, but Villaseca has also been hard at work growing the club behind the scenes.

"We have to grow in human resources," he says. "We focused on sporting talent, now we are making acquisitions in the administrative departments. A new marketing director, commercial director, a financial director.

"The club was in the fifth tier, and was like that at all levels - we only had three people. So we need to grow in that direction, and in the infrastructure - we need to build our own training facilities.

"As Andorra, we don't have much - we are not a powerhouse, we are a small village in the middle of the mountains so we have to offer something different. We need to offer players the best quality of sporting living, that is very important.

"We now have one of the best playing pitches in Spain - a hybrid of turf and artificial, it's heated which none of the other clubs in the second tier have - but the training facilities are all artificial, and he [sporting director Jaume Nogues] said: 'I cannot offer that, we need quality training facilities or no-one will be willing to join'.

"We need to make the club a second division club, and in some places we are still far away. It takes time - we have grown too fast!"

'Our DNA is similar to Barcelona'

Andorra's stadium only has a capacity of approximately 3,000 people

Under Pique's ownership, the links to Barcelona have been demonstrated by his choices of manager. Former team-mate Gabri oversaw the rise to the third tier, while ex-Barca B player Nacho Castro coached the club for just under a year until January 2021.

This was when Eder Sarabia - who served as number two to Quique Setien during his brief spell at Barcelona - was hired to his first senior managerial role, guiding Andorra to the second division 18 months later for the first time in their history.

A 1-0 win at home to UCAM Murcia sparked wild celebrations, and saw Sarabia come good on a promise to cycle from Andorra to Bilbao should promotion be secured.

"After Barcelona we had plenty of options but after Gerard's [Pique] call, I analysed the project and I realised that I had made the right choice and I am very excited," Sarabia tells BBC Sport.

"Above all, it is a family club, I like the club model, the management and the ambition to grow, with firm and solid steps and to be able to do important things.

"It has been fast, on the field we have advanced and grown a lot and we are getting stronger in every way."

Villaseca adds: "We understood what we wanted, and from a sporting direction created a DNA around that. When you play FC Andorra you know the way we play, it is similar to Barcelona DNA. We have been very clear since day one with the coaches we've had, and so we have had no issues adjusting among the players and staff.

"Culturally, Andorra is very similar to Barcelona - we are neighbours to Catalonia, and Barcelona is the most followed team in Andorra.

"Also the way we want to play, the players who understood it best were former Barcelona players, so we identified players who left Barca, maybe they have left to play abroad, we capture those players and utilise the skills they learned in Barcelona. We piggyback on their time in the youth squads in Barcelona."

Andorra's dramatic rise has not been without controversy. The European micronation has lower income tax levels than Spain, meaning players were paying 10 per cent if their contracts were more than €300,000 per year, compared to 47 per cent for clubs in the mainland.

Now under the control of La Liga, new rules have been brought in forcing them to limit the cost of their squad on a par with their Spanish counterparts.

"We don't like them, they are not fair at all," says Villaseca. "Spain is a country which does not have a unified tax system, so for one team these rules apply and for the others not. We're just studying what we should do next."

'We're not just Pique's corner of Andorra'

So far Andorra have been bloodying the noses of the expected promotion candidates. Home victories over Granada, Eibar and Levante have proven Sarabia's team are much more than a famous owner's vanity project.

They have some former Barca youth players impressing, such as centre back Mika Marmol and midfielder Jandro Orellana. Up top Sinan Bakis, a summer acquisition from Dutch side Heracles, leads the club scoring charts.

"We see the type of players we need, not the best ones, but the most suitable ones with a specific profile and assessing how they behave on and off the field," Sarabia says.

"Our objectives are to play very good soccer and that the game leads us to our goals, which is to consolidate our position in the league and continue growing."

The Pique connection has been the aspect of FC Andorra which has drawn the most attention, but Villaseca is at pains to point out the club has an identity in its own right.

"We try to avoid just being Pique's corner of Andorra," he says. "Gerard loves the project but he is not involved in the day to day - he is there to celebrate when the good things happen, and also to help when decisions have to be made.

"One of the things we like to do is work on statistics - Gerard loves his statistics, we are very much involved in the Moneyball style of recruitment.

"He likes to give his opinion on the sporting direction, he is a footballer after all and he says what he thinks. But it is more as a fan than a manager, his primary business is playing for Barcelona."

 

TAKEN FROM: https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/63139837

[CyderInACan]

Good to see them doing so well. It's an odd little place, with French & Spanish spoken widely as well as Catalan and English. Have been there skiing and it's a very friendly country, with a small population, much more of a village feel to it than it's own country. The hairpin bends on the coach trip up the Pyrenees were always, umm, exciting. . . 

Good on them. Still on an upward trajectory I feel. 

[Barry Sheene]

Over in Malaga this weekend to watch FC Andorra play Malaga supporting Malaga. 

Sadly the Malaga story is the opposite to Andorra as they are heading down the divisions after forgein owners withdrew funding and are in the bottom two of la Liga secunda. As recently as ten years ago they were in the champions League and getting  33k at home and my 50th birthday six years ago was spent watching them play Barcelona of the park beating them 2-0.

 

[ralphindevon]

Used to live a couple hours down the road from Andorra and was a regular visitor.

Its a great and interesting story which I’ll definitely follow from now on.

I must admit I’d struggle with the winter cold up there, especially when there’s mild sun not far away. Great for skiing and cheap booze and fags but you won’t be allowed to partake in any of that as a player of course.

[nebristolred]

On 17/08/2022 at 08:05, TRL said:

Biggest Question, how can a club in Andorra play in spain? Surely thats not right, i guess the same could be said for Cardiff and Swsnsea but they are in some sort of Union. Does Andorra have some sort of principality status with Spain? Or some hook up with the Spanish FA? I am guessing so if they play in their lower leagues.

There are all sorts of oddities in football and it can actually get even weirder than that. Ceuta play in the Spanish league but are actually based in Morocco, so theoretically the UCL could be won by a team in Africa.

It's also theoretically possible for a team from Réunion to compete in both the African Champions League and the European one at the same time. Maybe a challenge for Pep one day .

Edited October 6, 2022 by nebristolred

[Lanterne Rouge]

16 hours ago, nebristolred said:

There are all sorts of oddities in football and it can actually get even weirder than that. Ceuta play in the Spanish league but are actually based in Morocco, so theoretically the UCL could be won by a team in Africa.

It's also theoretically possible for a team from Réunion to compete in both the African Champions League and the European one at the same time. Maybe a challenge for Pep one day .

Don`t Tahiti compete in the French Cup too?

[CyderInACan]

19 hours ago, nebristolred said:

There are all sorts of oddities in football and it can actually get even weirder than that. Ceuta play in the Spanish league but are actually based in Morocco, so theoretically the UCL could be won by a team in Africa.

It's also theoretically possible for a team from Réunion to compete in both the African Champions League and the European one at the same time. Maybe a challenge for Pep one day .

But isn’t Ceuta a Spanish enclave? So it’s Spanish territory? I think there’s another enclave on the north afrIcan coast too. 

[Lanterne Rouge]

1 hour ago, CyderInACan said:

But isn’t Ceuta a Spanish enclave? So it’s Spanish territory? I think there’s another enclave on the north afrIcan coast too. 

Melilla? Something like that anyway.

[Bangkok Red]

On 08/10/2022 at 00:12, Lanterne Rouge said:

Melilla? Something like that anyway.

Yes, Melilla is the other Spanish enclave in Morroco - strange place, I caught the ferry from there after exiting Algeria.

Also, quite hypocritical of the Spanish to keep banging on about Gibraltar when they've still got those two ports in Morocco.