While the Premier League struggles to convince English football fans and the wider community around the world that a 39th fixture would give its product greater popularity, La Liga has taken a similar initiative and gone one better. From the 2010-11 season, Spanish teams will play an extra fixture in a series of venues around the globe to promote its already familiar brand.
In a statement released today, Tonto De Abril, LFP spokesman, revealed that negotiations have been taking place during the last nine weeks with numerous football federations around the world and a series of agreements are now in place. As a result, the following cities will host a '39th game' (or 'El Juego 39' as it's known in Spain) at the end of the 2011 campaign:
Bogota, Colombia
Umtata, South Africa
Lahore, Pakistan
Libreville, Gabon
Seoul, South Korea
Stuttgart, Germany
Halifax, Canada
Indianapolis, USA
Tomsk, Russia
Taipei, Taiwan
The sheer variety in these locations is quite deliberate, according to De Abril.
"We want to bring Spanish football to the many people around the world who so far could only have dreamed it or watched on their TV's. 'El Juego 39' has been welcomed in countries from Russia to South Africa and we believe our different cultures will combine to bring excitement to the fans of our respective nations."
The surprising element to this announcement comes amid defiant resistance to the idea first put forward by Premier League Chief Executive, Peter Scudamore. It's thought the Spanish authorities were prepared to do much more to promote the game in the countries where their own version of the 39th Game will be played in direct contrast to the English representatives who seemed merely intent on showcasing the English game and nothing more.
Reaction to the announcement in Madrid has been mixed with many people pleased to see the Spanish League promoted around the world in preference to the Premier League, while others were noticeably against the idea.
The popularity of the scheme, however, may rest on the date selected for the final game of the 2010-11 Spanish season to be played on. The suggestion of April 1st is proving to be controversial and is expected to be reviewed in the interim period.
Tuesday, April 01, 2008
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8 comments:
Poor choice of picture there, Messi is said to be in secret talks with Liverpool FC so probably won't make the 39th game, at least not the Spanish version!
The numerous footie fans in our office will be gutted that Tokyo is not on that list of venues.
TT
Messi coming to Liverpool would be incredible. But I don't think that will happen, not with Ronaldinho and Henry almost certainly leaving.
The strange thing about this story is that UEFA countries would agree to have La Liga games played on their soil. If Germans wanted to see a La Liga match couldn't they just take a short train ride to Spain?
And where are Platini and Blatter? They were up in arms when the EPL floated this (and rightly so). I'd like to believe that there isn't a continental bias, but if both stay mum on this issue, it will be hard to ignore.
OMG! I don't believe it. What a great idea! Just one thing tho. Why not England? I'd love to see Messi play. I live in Croydon. Could Barca play Madrid at Selhurst Park? Is David Beckham still there. OMG I hope this happens. I would just die if this was some sort of bad April fool gag. If I wanted to be taken the piss out of I'd go to the Onion Bag.
On the one hand you have the fact that it is obviously purely for money and that if these countries want to see English or Spanish football matches they should go to england or spain.
On the other hand you have the fact that you can't stop these things from happening. Also we would complain about more people coming here purely for football. We should spread the great glory that is the beautiful game.
It's a catch 22 to keep everyone happy. If only football was like what it was in the olden days.
From what I've been reading this morning, Platini and Blatter are actually prepared to sign off on the plan, largely because they see an expanded La Liga as the best chance to contain the influence of the PL in the next few years. There's even been talk of holding a Clasico match in London at some point in the future, which can only be interpreted as a gesture of defiance toward Scudamore.
Although the darker (and maybe more persuasive) rumor is that someone in the upper reaches of the La Liga bureaucracy has something fairly shocking on Blatter and is holding him hostage on the 39th game issue. So you never know.
Still, the hypocrisy is almost completely impossible to believe...
Ah, I'm almost ashamed to admit it, but I think many of you have fallen for my April Fool ruse!
Sorry - couldn't resist it... the clues were there... the name of the LFP spokesman ('April Fool' in English), the initial letters of the venues... perhaps I was a bit *too* subtle?!?! :-)
Amusing but don't think anyone fell for it, Chris. This Henry Winter article about the 'witty' & 'thoughtful' Beeb comms/pundits fooled me though:
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/main.jhtml?view=DETAILS&grid=A1YourView&xml=/sport/2008/04/01/sfnwin101.xml
TT
Ah April 1st, the day the internet is useless :)
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