Barcelona to help fund the Covid-19 fight by selling Camp Nou naming rights for the first time in history.

Barcelona’s stadium will have a formal name for the first time in its 63-year existence after the club announced plans to sell next season’s rights and hand the proceeds to charitable activities and the fight against coronavirus.

The Camp Nou,will now get a surname as the club seek a sponsor for 2020-21 – a first step towards the sale of the naming rights as construction begins on a new 105,000-capacity stadium which they hope to have completed on the same site within four years. The current Camp Nou is Europe’s largest football stadium.

Barcelona said that the plan fits their claim to be “more than a club” and that they hope to be able to “create a wave of hope for millions of people around the world who are suffering due to this pandemic”. A statement described this as a “global crisis without precedents” during which Barcelona have to “assume responsibility”.

“We are very happy to be able to drive forward this initiative that offers something as emblematic as the name of our stadium so that institutions, organisations, businesses may associate themselves with it and as such contribute to the fight against Covid-19 given that their investment will be used to finance research projects on the illness and projects that are working to eradicate to lessen its effects,” the statement said.