By David Gold
September 8 – A dozen La Liga sides have decided to press ahead with plans to reform Spanish televison rights after a meeting at Sevilla’s Ramon Sanchez Pizjuan Stadium today.
Sevilla had invited all La Liga sides to the meeting with the exception of Barcelona and Real Madrid, as the duo take half of the €600 million (£521 million/$844 million) television rights money in Spain.
Athletic Bilbao, Atlético Madrid, Real Betis, Espanyol, Granada, Malaga, Osasuna, Racing Santander, Valencia, Villarreal and Real Zaragoza all pledged to centralise and share TV income similar to other European league such as the Premier League.
Last year Barcelona and Real took double what Manchester United made in television revenue, but third placed Valencia barely earned €1 million (£870,000/$1.4 million) more than Blackpool, relegated from the Premier League last season.
Debts have crippled La Liga sides, and although Real Sociedad and Real Mallorca have recently come out of administration, four sides – Real Zaragoza, Real Betis, Granada and Rayo Vallecano, are all in serious financial peril.
A number of other sides, notably Sevilla, Valencia and Atletico Madrid, are all in significant debt as they struggle to keep pace with the top two in La Liga.
Jose Maria del Nido (pictured below centre), the Sevilla President, last week said that La Liga was “a load of rubbish” after Madrid and Barcelona continued their increasing dominance of the league with 6-0 and 5-0 wins on the opening day of the campaign against Real Zaragoza and Villarrreal respectively.
Last year Barcelona and Real Madrid finished on 96 and 92 points, with third place Valencia a further 21 points back.
The season before the big two won 99 and 96 points each, with Valencia 25 points behind, fuelling an increasing fear that La Liga is becoming a two team league similar to the Scottish Premier Division, where Celtic and Rangers have won every title between them since its formation in 1988, and only on one occasion have they not both finished in the top two positions.
The Spanish sides who met tonight want television rights to be controlled by the Spanish League (LFP), and Del Nido said: “None of the clubs present intend not to respect the contracts we have signed with the television broadcasters.
“This does not mean that we all will not work towards having a centralised sale together with the body that must conduct it, which is our Professional Football League.
“We reached the conclusion that either we continue down this path to avoid a lack of competition or football will have few options to solve the problem.”
Whilst Spain still does not have a collective bargaining agreement, they also do not have parachute payments to teams who are relegated from the top flight, as exists in England to protect teams from financial problems in the second tier.
This has led to a number of teams who have been relegated suffering financial issues in the following years, and it is notable that the three teams promoted last year are all in administration.
It has also fuelled increased spending as teams hope to avoid relegation, but this has also led to clubs falling into such perilous financial situations that they are unable to pay their wages.
More than €60 million (£52 million/$83 million/) has been owed to players who have not been paid their wages when their clubs have fallen into financial difficulty in the last two seasons in Spain, which led to the players strike which delayed the start of the season in the country’s top two divisions.
Last year talks took place between Barcelona, Real Madrid and the rest of La Liga’s sides on how a collective deal could be implemented, but the discussions were over a deal which would see the top two continue to take the bulk of TV money, albeit less so than now, with Atlético Madrid and Valencia then taking a larger share than the rest of the division’s teams.
Contact the writer of this story at zib.l1734831326labto1734831326ofdlr1734831326owedi1734831326sni@d1734831326log.d1734831326ivad1734831326
Related stories
August 2011: Strike action by players hits La Liga fixtures