Board member leaked Guardiola preference

A few weeks ago Catalan television channel TV3 brought the news that the Barcelona board had decided not to go on with Barcelona manager Frank Rijkaard (45) and that he would be replaced at the end of the season by Barcelona B manager Josep Guardiola (37) (read more here). Based on reports in Catalan sports paper Sport and Catalan sports weekly paper Gol, this blog can give a reconstruction of the events.

During a board meeting in the last week of March (before the Liga game against Betis Sevilla and the first leg of the Champions League quarter final against Schalke 04) the future of Frank Rijkaard was discussed. The option to dismiss the Dutchman immediately if Barcelona would not qualify for the Champions League semi finals was mentioned and there was a discussion about who could replace Rijkaard in that case until the end of the season (read more here).

The name of Guardiola was put forward by a majority of the board members but in the end it was agreed to let Rijkaard continue and finish the season to not prematurely burn Guardiola (read more here). The former Barcelona captain could then take over in the summer.

At the end of the meeting it was explicitly asked that the Guardiola option would not yet become publicly known. But not even a week later the whole board discussion was already in the media (read more here and here), which infuriated Barcelona president Joan Laporta, who felt betrayed.

Laporta got to know that it was one of the board members who had been talking to TV3 and at the next board meeting two weeks later, the president locked everyone in the room and said that nobody would leave before he knew who had filtered the Guardiola story to the press.

It was board member Evarist Murtra who stepped up and admitted his mistake, saying that he had been betrayed himself by a friend. Murtra put his function at the disposal of the club. In the end everything was cooled down withoug big decisions.

Read more:
Could Guardiola be the emergency solution?
Guardiola takes Mourinho's pole
Will Rijkaard finish the season?