La Liga
Spain arrests seven after racist incidents targeting Vinicius Jr
Police detained seven men on Tuesday over separate alleged hate crime incidents against Real Madrid football player Vinicius Jr as Spain’s main soccer league urged changes to Spanish law that would enable it to take steps to curb racism in stadiums.
Real Madrid manager Carlo Ancelotti expressed support for Vinicius Jr, whom he expected would remain at the club.
He lambasted Spain’s “obsolete” protocols to deal with racism in the sport, and said he would consider taking his players off the pitch if they were abused again during a game as Vinicius Jr was in Sunday’s LaLiga match at Valencia.
Puma, sponsor of both Valencia and LaLiga, also offered its support to Vinicius Jr, as did Spanish bank Santander, whose title sponsorship with LaLiga ends after this season.
“At PUMA, we do not tolerate racism, we condemn discrimination in any form and stand in solidarity with Vinicius Junior,” Puma said in a statement to Reuters.
A hate crime investigation was opened after an inflatable effigy dressed in the No. 20 jersey of winger Vinicius Jr was hung from a bridge in front of the club’s training grounds. Alongside it was a 16m (17.5-yard) red and white banner – the colours of rival team Atletico Madrid – that read “Madrid hates Real”.
Four men were arrested in Madrid, police said, three of whom were members of “a radical group of fans of a Madrid club”, who were previously flagged during matches as “high risk” to help curb violence during games.
Three men were also arrested in Valencia for racist conduct aimed at Vinicius Jr in Sunday’s match, police said on Twitter.
Vinicius Jr, in a social media post, called the racist abuse “inhuman” and asked sponsors and broadcasters to hold LaLiga accountable.
‘IMPOTENT’
Valencia’s south stand will be partially closed for five matches and the club fined 45,000 euros ($49,536), the Spanish Football Federation (RFEF) announced on Tuesday.
However, LaLiga said in an earlier statement that it felt “impotent” to tackle the issue while Spanish legislation limited its actions to merely detecting and reporting racist incidents
It urged that the law be modified so it could cancel matches and ban fans from stadiums if racist behaviour is detected.
“LaLiga is extremely frustrated by the lack of sanctions and convictions by sporting disciplinary bodies, public administrations and courts public administrations and the jurisdictional bodies to which complaints are made,” it said in a statement.
Vinicius has expressed frustration that LaLiga has not exerted pressure on the Spanish football federation, which does have the power to apply stadium closures and bans, according to sources close to the player.
The federation can cancel a match if racist insults continue after a 10-minute period in which the game is paused and the crowd warned. To date, no match in Spain has enforced it.
The Brazilian player was particularly aggrieved by comments made by LaLiga President Javier Tebas on Sunday, in which he accused the player of failing to turn up to meetings so that LaLiga could explain what it has been doing to address racism, sources close to the player told Reuters.
Vinicius was initially receptive to a meeting if it was held behind closed doors, according to the sources, but turned it down believing the LaLiga administrator was seeking publicity by holding it at its Madrid offices.
LaLiga declined to comment on the proposed meeting with Vinicius while the football federation did not respond to a request for comment about its powers to cancel matches.
The federation and LaLiga said on Tuesday they were launching a campaign until the end of the season against racism.
-Reuters
It was mission accomplished, said Real Madrid coach Carlo Ancelotti after his side fought back from two-goals behind to snatch a rip-roaring 4-4 draw on Tuesday for a 5-4 aggregate win that put them through to the Copa del Rey final.
Ancelotti brushed off questions about a sub-par performance by his side and praised his players’ effort in what he considered a highly entertaining encounter.
“We have achieved our goal today which was to reach the final and there is not much time to think about it,” Ancelotti told a press conference.
“It was an entertaining game with some mistakes and a lot of good things. It was fun and we are in the final.
“I never saw ourselves out of it because anything can happen at the Bernabeu. When we have to come from behind, we never give up. We never give up, especially at home, with the fans by our side.”
Ancelotti said David Alaba was not to blame after he deflected two balls into his own goal, calling it “bad luck” by the Austrian defender, but urged his defence to play with better focus moving forward.
“It’s not good to concede four goals in a game,” Ancelotti said.
“Right now we are a team that has a lot of effectiveness up-front, but little balance.
“However, we can’t ignore what we did in attack, scoring four goals against Real is not that easy. I think we are doing quite well.”
Real Madrid, who have won the Spanish Cup only once in over a decade, will play either Barcelona or Atletico Madrid in a mouth-watering final in Seville next month.
Atletico fought back to hold Barca to a thrilling 4-4 draw ahead of Wednesday’s second-leg in Madrid.
-Reuters
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Real Madrid’s legendary coach Carlo Ancelotti will go on trial next week for allegedly failing to declare income to Spain’s tax office, the Madrid court which will hear the case has said.
Prosecutors are seeking a jail term of four years and nine months for the 65-year-old Italian, accusing him of having cost Spain’s treasury more than one million euros ($1.1 million) in undeclared earnings from image rights in 2014 and 2015.
The trial will begin on Wednesday and it is expected to last two days, a spokesman for the court said.
Ancelotti, who as a coach has won a record five Champions League trophies including three with Real, must be present for the hearings, he added.
Prosecutors accuse him of only declaring in his tax returns the personal remuneration received from Real Madrid during those two years even though he himself declared himself to be a tax resident in Spain and indicated his home was in Madrid.
They accuse Ancelotti of allegedly setting up a “confusing” and “complex” system of shell companies to hide his extra earnings from his image rights as well as from other sources such as real estate.
A Spanish court in 2023 ordered Ancelotti to stand trial over the affair, but did not set a date.
Ancelotti dismissed the affair last year as “an old story that I hope will be resolved soon” when he was asked about the case.
He took over at Real Madrid in 2013, leaving in May 2015, before being appointed at Bayern Munich the following year.
The former Italy international midfielder, who as a player won the European Cup twice with AC Milan, later managed Napoli and Everton before returning to Real Madrid in 2021.
Aside from his success in the Champions League he has won domestic league titles with Madrid and Milan, in England with Chelsea, in Germany with Bayern Munich and in France with Paris Saint-Germain.
-AFP
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Spain’s former soccer chief Luis Rubiales told Reuters on Thursday he would appeal a court ruling which found him guilty of sexual assault for kissing player Jenni Hermoso without her consent.-
-Reuters
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