CATALUNYA - EUSKADI TICKETS Camp Nou, Sunday October 8 at 18.30

The forthcoming friendly between the national teams of i Catalunya and Euskadi (the Basque Country) has managed to stir up a fair bit of controversy. In the eyes of UEFA and FIFA, neither the Catalans or the Basques are officially recognised nations, and therefore their players wear the Spanish colours on the international stage. But both sets of people take their national sides very seriously indeed, and many share the same hope of one day being officially welcomed into the world arena.
But the message in a TV commercial promoting this game made by the Plataforma Pro Selecciones Deportivas Catalanas has not gone down at all well in some quarters. The ad shows a group of children playing footy in a park. They are all wearing different coloured shirts that accidentally on purpose happen to be very similar to the shirts of various major international teams. But when a young lad wearing the Catalan national jersey stalks up to the group and asks if he can join in, the lad wearing the red shirt and blue shorts gestures that he is not welcome.
The red and blue is of course Spain, and clever although the ad might be, many have not been overly impressed. For one, the way the ad uses children to portray adult politics could be considered a bit tasteless, as is the strong and highly provocative anti-Spanish message that it carries.
Partido Popular de Cataluna president Josep Pique was one of the most vociferous opponents of the ad, saying “some people are constantly trying to distance the people of Catalunya from those of Spain. This advert is very dangerous, and will stir up confrontations between the people living in Catalonia”.
Xavier Vinyals, chairman of the group that actively promotes the idea of separate national teams for Catalunya argues that the idea was none other than to “portray the reality that Catalan federations cannot progress onto the international arena because the Spanish ones are preventing them”.
It has to be said that the Spanish federations have never done an awful lot to help promote Catalan teams, but then again, since when was that ever something they were supposed to do?
But in order to stir up support among fellow Catalans, there is nothing more effective than the time-honoured tactic of pointing the blame at Spaniards. Where Catalans just don’t seem able to get a grip is that it is not really Spain’s ‘fault’ that they don’t have Catalan teams. The reason the likes of Slovakia, Macedonia, Latvia and Andorra have national teams is because they are now officially recognised as independent countries. Catalunya is not and whether they should be or should not be is not for UEFA, FIFA or the IOC to decide. Why should the Catalans be treated any differently to Bavaria, Quebec, Kurdistan, Kosovo, Chechenya, Corsica or Cornwall (not to mention Galicia, the Basque Country, the Canary Islands, and who knows, maybe even the Aragonese will be asking for a separate team next)?
Become an independent country and you get an independent national team. Like it or not, that is just the way it is. Saying that, a spanner is very definitely going to be to be put in the works when UEFA and FIFA officially recognise
Gibraltar, something that will happen any day now following a Court of Arbitration for Sport decision in Gib’s favour. This could get messier. Perhaps rather than playing these games and doing a bit of harmless flag waving, it’s time for the Catalans to really start showing they mean business. It would be easy. All they have to do is withdraw Barga from the Spanish league it should not be in anyway, and set up a separate Catalan championship. Somehow, however, we just can’t quite see that ever happening. But so to the game, and this is the second the Catalans have played this year, following a 2-0 defeat of Costa Rica in Terrassa shortly before the World Cup.
Playing at the Camp Nou and with the potential to field a remarkably strong team, the Catalans have never failed to attract decent opposition for friendly matches, which have included two games with Brazil and one with Argentina in recent years. As ever, there is the problem that games can only be organised on official international weekends, which means most of the best players, including Barga’s Carles Puyol, Xavi and Andres Iniesta, are generally away playing for Spain (who have a Euro 2008 qualifier in Sweden on Saturday). Other potential Catalan internationals include Cesc Fabregas of Arsenal, Barga’s Victor Valdes and Oleguer Presas, Espanyol’s Raul Tamudo, Ajax’s Gabri, Deportivos’s Albert Lopo and both the Luis Garcia of Liverpool and the Espanyol one. The Basques meanwhile, have also played several major international teams over the last decade or so, including wins against Uruguay, Ghana, Yugoslavia and Nigeria. Their most recent match was 1-0 defeat to Wales in May.
The core of the team is traditionally Athletic Bilbao, who have their ongoing all-Basque policy, with Real Sociedad, Osasuna and Alaves also supplying plenty of talent - not forgetting (pending injuries and selection for Spain) Xabi Alonso, Asier del Horno, Ivan Campo and Gaizka Mendieta. Depending on who gets to play this could be a fascinating game, and the atmosphere is always special for these occasions.
This will be the first meeting between the two sides since a testimonial match for Juan Gardeazabal in 1971, in which the Catalans won 2-1 in Bilbao.