If you want it you can get it, as long as it comes in FC Barcelona colours!

After melting for a few weeks a cold snap of 22 degrees at night has hit and now I am complaining of the cold, and to think I'm Scottish. But it is not as cold as the homeland. It is getting to that time of year where the Scottish football fan starts "layering up", thermals, jumper, jacket, club scarf and hat (bbbbrrrrrrrrrrrr, making me shiver thinking about it).

The serving of P n B today comes from the matchday programme of the 25th of August, Raith v Livingstone, which ended in a goalless draw, enjoy.

Paella and Bovril

After breaking up on the 22^nd on June the kids of Barcelona will be returning to school on the 12^th September (yes nearly 12 weeks!). So of course the local stores have been full of back to school stuff, and amongst all the usual paraphernalia needed for the return to academia and the well know household names in school wear, FC Barcelona has become one of the biggest names in school fashion.  

You name it you can get anything you want with FC Barcelona all over it, school bags, pencils, trainers, socks, swimming goggles and flip flops, but of course the Barca badge don’t come cheap.  The price for a kids replica top for 2012/13 can be anything from 55-75 Euros, adults can be paying up to and over  90 Euros. The pencils and pens with the Barca badges are about 3 times the prices of “normal” pencils, but who wants normal when you can have BARCAAAAAAAAAAAA, and of course with the start of the new season coming around the same time as the start of school everyone wants a piece of the action and a piece of Barca. Every shop has something for everyone, and everything. The local pet store has the “perfect little outfit” for your Chihuahua, and you can only drink your beer out of that engraved glass.  I was out and about the other day and popped into the local Carrefour supermarket and was greeted by a wall-to-wall display of all things Barca in this season’s summer collection!

I have to admit I find the onslaught of  “buy Barca” a little crazy.  But this club is HUGE and maybe the reason it is so international, is because there is something for everyone’s holiday budget.  Tourists come to visit Catalonia’s capital, not for the architecture, food or the beach but the museum at the Nou Camp. Summer after summer the number one tourist attraction is the “Museo” at Barca’s ground, and of course no visit to a museum is complete without a purchase from the gift shop. During the summer nearly every second “tourista” is proudly displaying on their arm the best bag in town, the official plastic bag from the club’s numerous shops over town.  It is a mad sight, the city is just bursting with every shape and size and nationality of Barca fan.  I think only Real Madrid fans don’t buy anything!  

Of course not every owner of a FC Barcelona shower cap are going to make it to the game, or name any player other than Messi, but their purchase has become part of a multi million business that football, at certain levels, has become, but has it done anything for the beauty of the game? People do say Barcelona play some of the worlds most beautiful football. The club attracts the best of the best to its dressing room and has a spectacular trophy room bursting with the top titles.  But how many other clubs CAN sell meat cleavers to raise a little bit of extra cash?  Maybe we should have the Raith Rovers kitten bowl collection next season!