Mojitos, gladiators, goals, and tapas were much in evidence at the Barca fiesta given by Jimmy Burns and his publishers at one of London’s hottest latino venues.

As a staff of beautful Spanish chicas shaked and crushed the cocktails, the music of salsa and flamenco drifted from below deck. Added thrills were provided by TV screens showing several new DVD’s of Barca’s triumphant 2008-9 season. The tapes had been flown in that afternoon from the Catalan capital specially for the occasion.

Also on screen on the night was the motivational video shown by Pep Guardiola to his team minutes before the start of the final in Rome. It features some of the best goals of the season by the likes of Messi, Iniesta, Pujol, Henry, Etooo, and Xavi, intercut with dramatic scenes and soundtrack from the film Gladiator. No prize for guessing who the 21^st century gladiators are.

Jimmy’s publishers Bloomsbury fielded an A team of their own and turned up laden with boxes filled with freshly printed copies of the new championship edition of the book Barca. Guests scrambled for signatures by the author before settling into a culinary spread of paella, tortilla, pinchos, chorizo, and jamon. The food was soon eaten. But those who missed the party should know that the new edition of the book is about to go on sale in bookshops and on Amazon and is worth tucking into as Barca prepares to defend three titles.

Talking to the assembled, Jimmy thanked his editor Bill Swainson at Bloomsbury for bringing out the new edition in record time and felt it stood as a fitting tribute to a great club. “Whether you are a Barca fan or not it is not difficult to recognise that this is a club tha believes in playing beautiful football.”

Bar&Co's boat was decorated with blue and red balloons and Barca scarves. Guests came from all ages and backrounds and reflected Barca’s popularity. They included former British ambassador to Spain and current chairman   of the Anglo-Spanish Society, Sir Stephen Wright, and FC Barcelona’s head of international  relations Chemi Teres who apologised for turning up late, and without any players.(They were training for the Wembley Cup). But Teres took away three signed copies of Jimmy’s book-one for himself, and the others for Lionel Messi and Thierry Henry, two of the author’s favourite players.

On the subject of  last weekend’s Wembley Cup. While clearly a rather crude marketing exercise by the sports giant IMG,  the brief summer tournament provided at least an opportunity to see some of the talent that Barca is encouraging through its youth training scheme. The Barca kids gave Spurs and the Egyptians a good lesson in total football-flair, flexibility, and creativity. Pity we were denied a game between Barca and Celtic. The fans would have loved it. Apparently Barca didn’t want to risk too many injuries before the start of what promises to be a very competitive season.