Can Barcelona really return to the Camp Nou next month?

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In just over a month, Barcelona will return to the Camp Nou for the first time since starting a €1.5billion (£1.3bn; $1.8bn) refurbishment project two years ago.

At least, that’s what the club is hoping.

Work on Barca’s stadium has already suffered several setbacks, with an original return date of November 2024 long since passed. Now the club is targeting August 10 — when Barca play their traditional season-opening friendly match, the Joan Gamper Trophy — for the big day.

That date represents a fifth rescheduling of the team’s expected return. Delays to the project have already forced Barca to play at the city’s Estadi Olimpic Lluis Companys much longer than expected, but the option of starting a third consecutive season there appears to have been ruled out. They no longer have permission to play at the ground, nor do they intend to apply for it.

Barca sources — who, like all those consulted for this article, preferred to contribute anonymously in order to speak freely — insist the club has no Plan B. They are confident the 2025-26 campaign will be spent back at the Camp Nou.

But even with such little time left before their return, question marks remain over exactly when they can be expected back there, and under what kind of circumstances.

When were Barca supposed to be back?

Work on the Camp Nou began in June 2023, with the aim of modernising the ground while increasing its capacity to 105,000, which would be the largest in European football.

The stadium was initially scheduled to reopen at about 60 per cent capacity in time for Barca’s 125th anniversary in November 2024 (with full completion in June 2026), but that date has been put back several times.

The November 2024 target was mentioned by Ebru Ozdemir, president of Limak, the construction company in charge of the works, in an interview with El Periodico in March 2023.

But in July 2024 came the first public signs of slippage. Barca vice-president Elena Fort said in an interview with the EFE news agency that work was “going according to plan”, but added: “As of today, we can confirm that the stadium will be ready for play by the end of the year.”

The following September, Barca president Joan Laporta said the club “didn’t want to set dates” for a return “because it might happen later or it might even happen earlier”.

“I believe that by the end of the year, we will be able to come back,” he added, speaking at a news conference.

That was still the message a month later in October. At another press conference, Fort repeated that construction was “on the right track”, but a Barcelona statement released a week earlier said the team was now expected to return “in the second half” of the 2024-2025 season.

Then, in an interview with Catalan radio station RAC1 in January 2025, Fort said: “There is no exact date, but we will return this season. It will be when we can, but before the end of this season.”

A bird’s-eye view of heaven on earth: Spotify Camp Nou. 🚁 pic.twitter.com/qrOsKTnG6C

— FC Barcelona (@FCBarcelona) May 28, 2025

While work on the Camp Nou went on, Barca made a temporary home at the Estadi Olimpic Lluis Companys across the city on Montjuic, a ground that has about 40,000 fewer seats than the old Camp Nou.

Barca had always planned to spend the entirety of the 2023-24 season there, but in early 2025, they had to apply to the local authorities to allow them to finish the 2024-25 campaign in the stadium.

That change of plan meant a Clasico with Real Madrid was now set for the same weekend as a Rolling Stones concert scheduled at their temporary home. Barca sources at the time said they considered the Camp Nou as a potential option for the May 11 fixture. In the event, the Rolling Stones cancelled plans for a European tour, leaving Barca free to play at Montjuic. 

In 2023, the club estimated that playing one season at Montjuic would cost them about €90m (£77m; $106m at current rates) in lost revenue. They ended up staying for two.

Cargando: Spotify Camp Nou pic.twitter.com/XUcxp9bXJ7

— FC Barcelona (@FCBarcelona_es) July 4, 2025

Last week, Barca announced they would return to the Camp Nou just over a month from now for the Joan Gamper Trophy on August 10, an annual friendly match that kicks off the new season. Speaking in early June, before the fixture was arranged, club sources said they expected the capacity for Barca’s Camp Nou return to be limited to 25,000.

However, as things stand, they do not have the necessary permits to do so, according to Barcelona’s deputy mayor, Laia Bonet.

“The work must be completed on time and in the proper manner in order to apply for the provisional first occupancy licence for the opening of the first and second stands,” she said at a news conference last week.

“We are not there yet and we need time to check that the stadium is in a condition to welcome spectators.”

In an interview with La Vanguardia published on Wednesday, Fort said the club remained “focused” on obtaining the required permits.

As for when the stadium is scheduled to be completely finished, she said: “I think we’ll be able to say the stadium is finished by the summer of 2026. Visually, it won’t be 100 per cent finished; the roof will still need to be closed. But everything will be there.”

Laporta said when announcing the Limak deal that there were “guarantees” the team would be back playing at the stadium in November 2024. He said these could include penalty charges of €1m that Limak would have to pay for each day past the November 2024 deadline. However, no such penalty charges have been made, and in January this year, Fort said any potential penalty charges could only be assessed after construction was completed in 2026.

Will Barca start this season at Camp Nou?

Barca sources say the club has not made any alternative plans to playing the Joan Gamper at the Camp Nou.

However, in her interview with La Vanguardia, in reply to a question about whether there was a Plan B and whether that might see the Joan Gamper played at the club’s Johan Cruyff stadium near the training ground instead, Fort replied: “Yes. Life isn’t 100 per cent predictable, there’s always the possibility of something happening.”

Fort also mentioned a “load test” the club plans to carry out and said its results would determine the capacity at which the Camp Nou could re-open. She said this would be conducted without any spectators, with “suppliers, the media and the city council, which obviously has to give its approval” attending instead. Local police and emergency services will also have to check access, while validation from UEFA and La Liga will be needed.

“The first half of July, or the first 10 days of July, will determine everything,” Fort added.

Elena Fort speaking at an October press conference (Javier Borrego/Europa Press via Getty Images)

In terms of the new La Liga season, Barca asked for their first matches to be scheduled away from home and the competition body has granted this. Barca’s first three games are away trips, with their first home fixture scheduled for the weekend of Saturday, September 14, when they host Valencia (the exact date will be confirmed closer to the time). The first round of the Champions League league phase is due to be played from September 16.

With so many issues still up in the air, though — including the missing permits and the uncertainty around what capacity the ground can open at — Barca have not been able to start any ticket sales for matches. Usually, season ticket sales begin in the first weeks of June, but the process has still not started. Nor have any tickets gone on sale for the Joan Gamper friendly next month.

Barca sources remain confident all will be well, but in terms of alternatives, Barcelona city council sources say it would not be possible for Barca to return to playing at Montjuic because a series of concerts are already scheduled there that cannot be cancelled.

City council sources also confirmed that Barca have made no request to further use the stadium, but added that the stadium could, in theory, be re-adapted to football use within a week, so long as it did not mean disruption to concert dates.

As for the Johan Cruyff stadium mentioned in Fort’s La Vanguardia interview, this is the 6,000-capacity stadium used by Barcelona’s women’s team and the men’s reserves team. It is difficult to see how the ground could be used by the senior men’s side.

Media reports suggest Italian side Como, managed by former club midfielder Cesc Fabregas and with Sergi Roberto among their number, will be Barca’s opponents for the Joan Gamper. The Athletic approached Como for confirmation, but they declined to comment.

Why have there been so many delays?

The initial November 2024 return date — at reduced capacity — held huge symbolic value for Barca, but several problems have contributed to the delays seen since.

Senior figures at the club have tended to explain these by referring to “unforeseeable circumstances” — Laporta being the most recent to do so at a May press conference.

Barca have pointed to the discovery of an unknown high-voltage line on the site, the company that was set to supply the iron for the stadium going bankrupt, bureaucratic problems in bringing in skilled labour from outside the European Union, and various problems that Limak had with several suppliers trying to increase raw material costs. Limak, in a June press release, said the Camp Nou project was “progressing on schedule, with completion expected in 2026”.

Complaints from local residents about noise and light also restricted the working patterns constructors had planned to follow. A timetable of permitted works was agreed upon at a meeting between the Camp Nou neighbours’ association, Barcelona city council, and FC Barcelona. It allowed work to continue until midnight as long as it did not involve the most disruptive aspects in terms of noise and light.

The Camp Nou construction site on May 23 (Josep Lago/AFP via Getty Images)

According to residents, there were several breaches of this, and after several incidents in which the police were called, the timetable was altered so that work had to stop by 10pm. Then it was agreed that work could continue until midnight, but only if it was internal work that did not involve noise or light pollution. In March, the city council granted special permission allowing work to continue 24 hours a day (except for weekends), which is currently valid until August 2.

Meanwhile, a report published in April by local media outlet Ara claimed further delays had been caused by a decision to prioritise the construction of a section of VIP seats, which had important implications for the club’s finances, as further explained below.

What does this mean for Barca’s finances?

Having the Camp Nou ready to host games won’t just provide the club with a bigger source of income and put an end to the rent they pay to play at Montjuic, it will also have a direct impact on their capacity to sign and register new players.

The Catalans are currently above the salary limit that La Liga set for them, which means the competition forces them to offload current salaries before registering new ones.

A major reason they are above their salary cap is that Barcelona’s latest asset sale — VIP seating at the revamped Camp Nou — could not be included in their current budget.

Crowe, an audit company that currently works with Barcelona, assessed that the €100m the Catalans received from Middle Eastern investors for the sale of the VIP seats can’t be counted as an asset because the actual seats had not been built yet.

Club sources say that builders at the Camp Nou are focused on building all of those VIP seats before the end of summer.

Joan Laporta speaking at a Barca press conference in June (Javier Borrego / AFP7 via Getty Images)

They believe that as soon as the VIP seats are built, auditors will allow the inclusion of that €100m in the club’s accounting, and that would enable Barcelona to return to a stable financial position regarding their salary limit.

The budget for the entire Espai Barca — the name for the extensive renovation project, which also includes the Palau Blaugrana multi-sport arena, the campus and the urban development of the area — is €1.5bn.

The price that Limak committed to complete the new Camp Nou was €990m, but during the process, a green light was given for the construction of a Skywalk, a viewing platform from which the whole of Barcelona will be visible. The cost of this was not included in the agreed budget and will be added as an extra.

On Wednesday last week, Fort told La Vanguardia that the original budget would be met, and that “there’s no red line that makes us think it will become more expensive”.

She added: “This year we already have some advance payments, but everything is under control. Furthermore, we’ve secured the debt refinancing we wanted because people believe so strongly in the project. The estimates are that we’ll triple the operating income we had at the previous Camp Nou.”

(Top photo: Josep Lago/AFP via Getty Images)

This news was originally published on this post .

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