Josep Samitier

Lore & Background

During his playing career with Barcelona, Samitier scored 187 official goals and was the club's all-time highest goalscorer at the time of his retirement. As of 2020, he is the club's fifth all-time top goalscorer behind Luis Suárez, László Kubala, César, and Lionel Messi. As a player, Samitier pioneered the midfield general role and was nicknamed (The Surrealist) and (The Grasshopper Man) due to his style. As a manager, he led Barcelona to a title in La Liga in 1945, and as a scout he recruited another Barcelona legend, László Kubala.

However, Samitier was later accused of acting as a double agent when the club tried to sign Alfredo Di Stéfano, and in the 1960s, he fell out with Helenio Herrera and went to work for Real Madrid. Despite his role in the Di Stéfano affair, twice defecting to Real Madrid, and his friendship with Francisco Franco, Samitier remained a legendary figure of FC Barcelona. When he died in 1972, he was given a state funeral and a street that leads to Camp Nou.

Reader's Guide

Born in Barcelona, Catalonia, Samitier played as a junior for FC Internacional before, at the age of 17, he made his debut for FC Barcelona in 1919. As his signing-on bonus, he received a luminous watch and a three-piece suit. Among his teammates at the club was his childhood friend Sagibarba. During holidays at the Catalan resort of Cadaqués, Samitier and Sagibarba had played football with, among others, Salvador Dalí.

He was also friends with the famous Spanish artist Salvador Dalí. By 1925 Samitier was the highest-paid player in Spain. He was a member of the legendary FC Barcelona team, coached by Jack Greenwell, that, apart from Sagibarba, also included Paulino Alcántara, Ricardo Zamora, Félix Sesúmaga and, later, Franz Platko. Between 1919 and 1933 he won twelve Campionat de Catalunya titles, five Copa del Rey and the very first La Liga title in the 1929 season.

Among the goals he scored were four in the Copa del Rey finals of 1922, 1925, 1926 and 1928. In 1933 an aging Samitier found himself in dispute with the FC Barcelona management and he was dropped from the first team. Real Madrid, then known as Madrid CF, were quick to take advantage of the situation. Although his career with the Madrid club was short, he did help them win a title in La Liga 1932–33 and the Copa de España in 1934.

In 1936 Samitier made a brief start to his career as a coach. He succeeded Fred Pentland at Atlético Madrid in the middle of the season, but failed to prevent them from being relegated. However, Samitier's new career and Atlético's relegation were postponed with the start of the Spanish Civil War. He found himself arrested by an anarchist militia, but was eventually released and left for France on a warship.

In October 1936 he joined OGC Nice as a player, where he was reunited once again with Ricardo Zamora. He subsequently scored 21 goals in 48 matches for the French team. He eventually retired as a player in 1939 and was briefly coach at OGC Nice in 1942. Samitier returned to Spain and became manager of CF Barcelona in 1944. In 1945 he guided them to only their second ever La Liga title.