Quotes About Barcelona

#1. Here in Barcelona, it's the architects who built the buildings that made the city iconic who are the objects of admiration - not a bunch of half-witted monarchs.

Julie Burchill

#2. Thierry Henry, he was definitely the best. He was just too quick. Oh God, what a player he was. I was so relieved when he went to Barcelona. He used to have everything. You couldn't even kick him, he was big and strong, oh, Jesus, he was a nightmare

Jamie Carragher

#3. You'd have a hard time finding anything better than Barcelona for food, as far as being a hub. Given a choice between Barcelona and San Sebastian to die in, I'd probably want to die in San Sebastian.

Anthony Bourdain

#4. With her enchanting songs, her rare beauty, and clever tricks, this wild 'wanderess' ensnared my soul like a gypsy-thief, and led me foolish and blind to where you find me now. The first time I saw her, fires were alight. It was a spicy night in Barcelona. The air was fragrant and free.

Roman Payne

#5. I've turned down Barcelona, Inter Milan, Juventus and Manchester United to play here. I hope everyone already knows how much it means to me to play for Newcastle United.

Alan Shearer

#6. Right now I'm living my boyhood dream, which was to play for a European club. The fact that it's a huge club like Barcelona makes it a tremendous honour. I like everything about the city: the climate, the people. It's quite similar to Brazil, which helps a lot. There's even a beach!

Neymar

#7. I like a lot of sports. Especially football - it's my favourite sport. My uncle played football in Barcelona for nine years and played for Spain in three World Cups.

Rafael Nadal

#8. When I came to Barcelona, I really liked in the dressing room that I found balanced, normal people: Valdes, Puyol, Iniesta. They don't think they are the center of the world for being football players.

Lilian Thuram

#9. It appeared that even in Barcelona there were hardly any bullfights nowadays; for some reason all the best matadors were Fascists. They

George Orwell

#10. The news of the open military help to Franco from Hitler and Mussolini, and the heroic resistance of the people of Madrid, Barcelona and the big cities fired a widespread wish to help the Republic and its people.

Bill Alexander

#11. I really did not think much about the size of the transfer fee when I left Barcelona because it was all down to market forces, not me.

Luis Figo

#12. I wrote every day between the ages of 12 and 20 when I stopped because I went to Barcelona, where life was too exciting to write.

Colm Toibin

#13. My father's parents were from Sardinia and my mother's from Barcelona.

Eric Cantona

#14. The truth is my idea has been to always stay at Barcelona and see out the rest of my career here. Like I always say, one doesn't know what can happen in the future, but if it were up to me to decide, I would stay at Barcelona for the rest of my career.

Lionel Messi

#15. I think that as a teenager in England, it's very hard to avoid Europe. You see Barcelona, and you see all those places as a youngster. You go there on school trips and everything, but America is like a different planet.

Simon Taylor-Davis

#16. Barcelona is one of my favourite cities in the world. The fashion and people are just so effortlessly cool.

Leigh Lezark

#17. I never wanted to or expected to make a film outside of New York. New York became very, very expensive. The same $18 million spent in Barcelona or Rome goes much further there.

Woody Allen

#18. Barcelona are my favourite team in Spain, let's put it that way.

Frank Lampard

#19. I want to concentrate on winning things with Barcelona and Argentina. Then if people want to say nice things about me when I have retired, great. Right now, I need to concentrate on being part of a team - not just on me.

Lionel Messi

#20. I am an Arsenal player and I don't think about anything else. I'm not going to say no to anybody, nor am I going to say yes to anybody. I did not say that I was going to leave Arsenal to go to Barcelona, because equally Barcelona doesn't want me.

Cesc Fabregas

#21. Slow travel now rivals the fly-to-Barcelona-for-lunch culture. Advocates savour the journey, travelling by train or boat or bicycle, or even on foot, rather than crammed into an airplane. They take time to plug into the local culture instead of racing through a list of tourist traps.

Carl Honore

#22. Great teams always have a Plan B. Look at Barcelona. Their Plan B is to stick to Plan A

Johnny Giles

#23. Like so many of the players, I started at La Masia at the age of 11. I can't ever imagine not playing for Barcelona, let alone not playing soccer for a career. I don't ever want to play anywhere else.

Xavi

#24. The Christmas market at the Barcelona Cathedral sells all kinds of things for your Nativity scene. It will also give you a good idea of Catalan culture.

Jose Andres

#25. You feel like half of your life is a vacation when you go to these Barcelona music festivals and have all day to sound check or go to the pool.

Hamilton Leithauser

#26. I first went to Barcelona in 1975 after university, and I stayed for three years. I learnt Catalan because that's what everyone speaks in the mountains. They speak English to foreigners, but what people say to each other is much more important than what they say to you.

Colm Toibin

#27. Leo [Messi] is the best player of all time - better than Pele, Maradona or Cruyff. There have been some great teams in history - Pele's Brazil, Cruyff's Ajax, Sacchi's Milan - but in the past 20 years this Barcelona team is the best.

Xavi

#28. The haunting of history is ever present in Barcelona. I see cities as organisms, as living creatures. To me, Madrid is a man and Barcelona is a woman. And it's a woman who's extremely vain.

Carlos Ruiz Zafon

#29. I always try to start my weekend by running on the beach, which is great fun here in Barcelona.

Daniel Bruhl

#30. To me, doing the Olympics in 1992 in Barcelona for NBC, just seeing the Dream Team take the floor, was a thrill for me. I don't think there was another team in any sport with that high level of athletes playing together.

Marv Albert

#31. Everyone's got unfinished business with Barcelona. They're the greatest team in the world.

Frank Lampard

#32. I don't speak Spanish. I understand enough of it, having spent some time running Telemundo, and I put in a lot of time in Spain during the Barcelona Olympics. But I don't pretend to speak Spanish, and I don't want anyone to think that I can.

Randy Falco

#33. FC Barcelona is the national team of Catalonia

Carles Puyol

#34. Life is full of problems, although life was wonderful in Barcelona in those days, and problems were called surprises.

Roberto Bolano

#35. When you play a team with as much attacking power as Barcelona and you restrict them to one shot on target in the second leg, you are doing something right. Have the best football team gone through? Yes. Have the best organised team gone through? No.

Jamie Redknapp

#36. At first I didn't think I was going to fit into Barcelona's way of playing. There was a lot of tiki-taka and I was thinking that without a lot of space to play in, I'd find it more difficult. I worried about that.

Luis Suarez

#37. Most Barcelona fans are kids who have watched football for the first time yesterday

Didier Drogba

#38. I don't have to be jealous of Barcelona because they have 100 years of history and have won the European Cup once. I have only been managing for five years and I have the same amount of Champions League trophies to my name.

Jose Mourinho

#39. To travel across Spain and finally to reach Barcelona is like drinking a respectable red wine and finishing up with a bottle of champagne.

James A. Michener

#40. Maybe one small regret is that I never got to play with Paul Scholes - but I was never going to leave Barcelona and he was never going to leave Manchester United.

Xavi

#41. For 'Vicky Cristina Barcelona,' for example, Woody Allen is one of the greatest American directors, and we really had a very good working relationship. We understand each other really well. He gave me one of the best opportunities somebody has ever given me in my career.

Penelope Cruz

#42. People travel north from Barcelona, not south.

Jose Andres

#43. A king who dies on the cross must be the king of a rather strange kingdom. Only those who understand the profound paradox of the cross can also understand the whole meaning of Jesus' assertion: my kingdom is not of this world. 2 Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Lectures to the Congregation in Barcelona

Dietrich Bonhoeffer

#44. I chose Real Madrid instead of Barcelona because I'm a winner, not a loser

Alfredo Di Stefano

#45. There are a lot of teams that don't want to play, that only want to defend against Barcelona, and that makes it difficult. We're always looking for the open space. A lot of times we'll face six defenders and four midfielders.

Xavi

#46. Barcelona is one of the best cities in the world. I love it there. I love Big Sur. It's stunning and you get a therapeutic experience there. The drive up the coast is one of the most beautiful I've ever done. Also, Hong Kong. I could easily live there!

Meghan Markle

#47. There's something special about racing in real streets. The 'artificial' circuits have a certain sameness to them. But every race conducted on real streets has a character of its own - Barcelona, Monaco, and now Long Beach.

Mario Andretti

#48. Barcelona is now in the past. I was sick and boxed in, and that's understandable why I lost.

Noureddine Morceli

#49. I can remember certain Manchester United defeats the way most people remember family bereavements or great political events. The four-nil drubbing by Barcelona, the failure to score against West Ham, the New Year's Day calamity at home to Spurs, the mauling by Middlesborough.

Tom Dunne

#50. Because of my job, I get a lot of opportunity to grab a few days here and there in many cool cities for press commitments, magazine shoots and premieres - Barcelona, Madrid, Rome, Paris, Stockholm, New York, Berlin. I always try to get to a gallery or museum if there's time.

Natalie Dormer

#51. Asking Siri where the nearest sushi bar is - that's not interesting. What's interesting is asking your phone where one of your friends have last had dinner in the neighborhood, or having it recommend a cool paella place in Barcelona because it knows you eat paella all the time at home.

Dennis Crowley

#52. When I left Barcelona, staying in Spain was an important factor in my decision to join Madrid. I did not have to change country or learn a new language, adopt a different sort of lifestyle, and so on.

Luis Figo

#53. Rudolf the Red-Nosed Reindeer, dead at 53. Over Barcelona today, the famed reindeer was hit by a flock of seagulls and a 747. Eyewitnesses report, that the reindeer in Spain was hit mainly by the plane.

Colin Mochrie

#54. For 'Around the World in 80 Plates' we got to travel all over, having what was like a cross between a culinary competition and races. And in each country we had a chef Ambassador. We went to London, Barcelona, Bologna, Hong Kong, Thailand, Morocco ... It was amazing.

Curtis Stone

#55. When Seoul hosted the Games in 1988, it became a symbol of the Asian Tigers' ascent onto the world stage. In 1992, the Barcelona Olympics represented the unification of Europe. And when Rio plays host in 2016, it will reinforce the growing importance of Brazil and Latin America as a whole.

Eduardo Paes

#56. Italy has great food and Barcelona has great energy.

Stefon Harris

#57. Everybody at Barcelona loves Messi. They can't speak highly of him

Gordon Strachan

#58. You're wrong about me, because we can be friends if you let me try, now that you know how worthless I am. And you're wrong about Barcelona, too, because you may think you've seen everything, but I can guarantee that's not true. If you'll allow me, I can prove it to you.

Carlos Ruiz Zafon

#59. On his homesickness during the Barcelona Olympics -I miss America. I miss crime and murder. I miss Philadelphia. There hasn't been a brutal stabbing or anything here the last 24 hours. I've missed it.

Charles Barkley

#60. While studying at Barcelona, Ignatius was in doubt whether, after completing his studies, he should enter some Religious Order, or go from place to place, according to his custom. He decided to enter upon the religious life.

Saint Ignatius

#61. I live between Barcelona and Berlin. Staying in Spain over the winter and Berlin for spring and summer is an ideal combination.

Daniel Bruhl

#62. If one day I have to leave Barcelona, probably the first thing I will look into is Arsenal

Cesc Fabregas

#63. I really love the Olympics: Daley Thompson's back-flip, Derek Redmond's father helping him finish the 400m after his hamstring snapped at the 1992 Games in Barcelona, Carl Lewis, Michael Johnson, Sir Steve Redgrave - childhood memories are flooded with these moments and idols.

Giles Duley

#64. Did you used to play for Barcelona? Because that's not Barcelona football.

Cesc Fabregas

#65. Obviously, it gave me a chance to see Barcelona. I won't deny that. But I also had a chance to see something in another country in terms of recycling and reusing nuclear material.

Ed Pastor

#66. I am a believer in passing the ball on the ground, I was lucky to be part of teams like that at Arsenal, with the French national team and with Monaco and at Barcelona. I know you can win in other ways, but I believe that is the way football should be played.

Thierry Henry

#67. 'One Minus One' and 'Barcelona, 1975' are more or less autobiographical.

Colm Toibin

#68. I'd love to be popular in Barcelona. That sounds like a fun job.

Bobby Heenan

#69. Ronaldo could play for Millwall, QPR, Doncaster Rovers or anyone and he'd score a hat-trick. I'm not sure Messi could do it. Ronaldo's got two feet, he's quick, he's good in the air and he's brave, though Messi's brave too of course. I just think Messi is a Barcelona player.

Alex Ferguson

#70. And call me a pig, but isn't it brilliantly refreshing how early the Dutch eat dinner? When they're still laying out the cutlery in achingly hip Barcelona, they're hanging the Closed sign on the restaurant doors of old Amsterdam.

Julie Burchill

#71. The Cemetery of Forgotten Books is like the greatest, most fantastic library you could ever imagine. It's a labyrinth of books with tunnels, bridges, arches, secret sections - and it's hidden inside an old palace in the old city of Barcelona.

Carlos Ruiz Zafon

#72. Celtic, like Barcelona, are more than a football club. Our clubs are a symbol of a culture and community that has not always been made welcome in their respective countries.

Xavi

#73. Barcelona is always a club that, at the beginning of the season, wants to win everything. I will try my best to do that with them and I'm sure I will help as much as I can.

Thierry Henry

#74. I was captain in Atletico at 19, playing in the same team as Demetrio Albertini, who won three Champions Leagues, and Sergi Barjuan from Barcelona, who had won everything, and they were 32, 33. I was a kid as captain, so I wasn't the real captain, just a kid learning from them.

Fernando Torres

#75. When I arrived at Barcelona, I was following a dream, but I now realize sometimes it's better to be content with what you have rather than follow a dream which nearly kills you.

Zlatan Ibrahimovic

#76. I love Spanish cities, particularly Barcelona, Madrid and Palma, which has the most amazing cathedral that I once went to for a wedding.

Louise Nurding

#77. Barcelona is a very old city in which you can feel the weight of history; it is haunted by history. You cannot walk around it without perceiving it.

Carlos Ruiz Zafon

#78. I am a curious creature and put my finger in as many cakes as I can: history, film, technology, etc. I'm also a freak for urban history, particularly Barcelona, Paris and New York. I know more weird stuff about 19th-century Manhattan than is probably healthy.

Carlos Ruiz Zafon

#79. Watching soccer is my main hobby, really. I'm no tactician or coach, but I enjoy watching the free flow of it, the different styles, and the histories behind clubs. Like Barcelona vs. Madrid - it's not just a soccer game; it's a geopolitical struggle. There are great storylines and no commercials.

Andrew Luck

#80. One thing I've done in my life is train year-round to compete at anything, anything. I've got an invitation now to maybe be on the karate team for the Barcelona Olympics. I'm debating whether I want to do that. I just love to compete, and I want to win.

Herschel Walker

#81. Whoever Barcelona are playing, you're just interested to watch because Messi's playing.

Luol Deng

#82. Carles Puyol is a Barcelona legend. He could have been playing every two weeks but he has shown dignity until the end.

Cesc Fabregas

#83. The fact that an Englishman has an Argentinian as an idol is very rare. I keep watching my [title-winning] goal against QPR and every time I get more emotional. My plan is to stay here because I'm convinced Manchester City will be at the same level as Real Madrid and Barcelona.

Sergio Aguero

#84. Welcome to the Nou Camp stadium in Barcelona that is packed to capacity ... with some patches of seats left empty.

George Hamilton

#85. I have my Master's Degree but I learned more at my dinner table than any class I ever took. My dad would come home from the sweat factory and put the money on the table and say Mea, here is some money for insurance and food and we always had that little extra for Friday night pizza at Barcelona's.

Dick Vitale

#86. I can live in Paris for four months or London or, you know, Barcelona. These are places that are like New York. But I don't think I could live in many places. When I had to make a film in the United States I picked San Francisco because to me it's one of the great cities of America.

Woody Allen

#87. It was a hot sticky night in Barcelona and all the good whores had the summer flu.

Dan Jenkins

#88. It doesnt change much for me really and my motivation remains the same - to create a beautiful future with Barcelona, winning many titles.

Ronaldinho

#89. Barcelona is my life. They have brought me to where I am today. I could not leave, I don't want to leave. I know the Premier League is very good. But I cannot see myself playing in England because my heart is with Barcelona, always.

Lionel Messi

#90. Barcelona is a special track. I have always loved the layout of the circuit, but also the atmosphere and the fans are special. It has always been good fun.

Valentino Rossi

#91. Blue skies of Barcelona. I took a taxi to the school, where I expected to be

Carlos Ruiz Zafon

#92. But if there was no Barcelona why would you get out of bed in the morning?

Ray Hudson

#93. Barcelona players are passing the ball at least 25 times to reach the goal, while Real Madrid's Xabi Alonso is doing this all in a single pass.

Roberto Mancini

#94. Apart from Arsenal and Barcelona, I don't see myself playing anywhere else. I will definitely be going back (to Arsenal) whenever I have time to watch games and to see the guys ... and if there is one place to go back to (to play), it is Arsenal for sure.

Cesc Fabregas

#95. My husband and I like cities. We like to go to other cities. Madrid, Barcelona, Paris, London. We're not big beach people. We're the type that get those books out and go to every museum. We are those people.

Julie Halston

#96. Liverpool are one of the dynasties of the game. They have won five European Cups and their status is up there with AC Milan, Inter Milan, Barcelona, Real Madrid and Bayern Munich.

Brendan

#97. It will be difficult to finish my career here. I don't know if I am going to end it at Barcelona, although I would like to. I don't know what is going to happen.

Xavi

#98. Red Bull is committed to providing not only quality domestic soccer, but also quality international soccer. You can't get much better than Barcelona. Our entire organization is excited about the opportunity to play one of the premier teams in the world.

Alexi Lalas

#99. England really is the birthplace, the heart and soul of football. If Barcelona had Liverpool's fans, or Arsenal's, or United's, we'd have won 20 Champions Leagues, hahaha!

Xavi

#100. Set between England and the Spanish Canary Islands, three women learn the truth about their shared past, and discover the importance of family. Spain, 1939. Following the wishes of her parents to keep her safe during the war, a young girl, Julia, enters a convent in Barcelona.

Rosanna Ley