The president-elect maintained a close relationship with Márquez at the Blaugrana club, offering flattering ideas about the future that the now-American striker had in his early days.
Joan Laporta will experience a second phase as president of Barcelona, the first of them, between 2003 and 2010, was characterized by the presence of Mexican players in the Blaugrana roster, in which he stood out Rafael Marquez, even the manager came to express his wish to find a ‘Hugo Sánchez’ for Barcelona ahead of the promising career of Young people and Jonathan dos Santos.
In 2007, the Barcelona went on tour of Asia in which Giovani dos Santos It was one of the novelties, as he arrived as U-17 World Champion and one of the main prospects was from La Masía, so the journalist Diego Laje asked the manager about the future of the elder of the brothers: that could be a better name. then have Hugo Sánchez in Spain and in the world? ”.
“I hope I have as many or more names than Hugo Sanchez since he is a Mexican reference player, we have the satisfaction of having right now Rafa Marquez as a Mexican benchmark player playing for Barça and I think Giovani is called out as one of the great Mexican players, which are a reference, that in this case we also have the fortune that he plays for Barça. You have to follow him closely because he is still very young, but by playing alongside the players he plays with, I think his quality will improve, which is very good ”.
Laporta started his first phase as president of Barcelona in 2003 and one of his first signings was that of Rafael Marquez, who left Monaco in the same year to defend the Catalan squad after a promise Joan made to representative Jorge Mendes.
“Two weeks pass and the front desk secretary tells me she’s bringing a boy and says she’s meeting you but I hadn’t met anyone yet but she told me it was someone who was from Monaco and then I started to link history. (Jorge) came in and said to me, ‘President, here tI receive the letter from Monaco which they sell to Rafa Márquez for five million euros“and the negotiations with the others stopped and we signed Márquez”.
Four years after the arrival of Márquez, who won titles with the Catalans, appeared Giovani dos Santos in the stellar template of BarcelonaHowever, he only belonged to one season when he was sold to Tottenham, but his brother Jonathan stayed in La Masía, making his debut in 2009.
Laporta’s first phase in the Catalans’ presidency ended in June 2010 and a month later Márquez left the club to sign with MLS’s New York Red Bulls, while the youngest of the Dos Santos remained on the team until 2014, the year he signed with Villarreal.
The relationship between Laporta and Márquez lives onEven the ‘Kaiser’ supported the Spaniard in his candidacy for the Barcelona presidency, as Joan won last Sunday.