A Spanish first division game between Real Oviedo and Espanyol was halted by a player protest on Friday night, part of a series of player protests against an upcoming LaLiga overseas game in Miami.
Players refused to play for the opening 15 seconds of the game, leaving an eerie spectacle for fans in the stadium. However supporters watching on television may not have realized that anything was amiss as the league’s world television feed cut to the stadium exterior for the first 25 seconds.
Ahead of the game Spain’s players’ union issued a statement saying: “Players will protest in a symbolic fashion to denounce the lack of transparency, dialogue and coherence of LaLiga regarding the possibility of playing a game in the United States.”
Earlier this month UEFA, European soccer’s governing body, approved plans for a competitive LaLiga fixture to be played at the Miami Dolphins’ Hard Rock Stadium. The game will be played between Barcelona and Villarreal but the league’s other clubs are not happy with the precedent that it sets.
Similar protests are expected across LaLiga this weekend, drawing attention to the increasingly busy playing calendar. Both Barcelona and Villarreal are playing in the recently-expanded Champions League this season and Barcelona will be travelling to Saudi Arabia to take part in the Supercopa de España in January.
Barcelona head coach Hansi Flick is among those to have spoken out against the Miami game, questioning the decision to impose a 4,500-mile journey on his team during a busy part of the season.
“My players are not happy, I am not happy, but La Liga decided that we will play this game,” Flick said this week.
But despite the protestations of players, coaches and many fans, LaLiga appears in intent on moving more games to foreign locations in a bid to expand the reach of the league. In 2019 the Supercopa de España was expanded from a one-off game to a four-team tournament and moved to Jeddah in Saudi Arabia.
The Miami game is just the latest step in that trend, one that LaLiga president Javier Tebas has claimed will help to increase “revenues in the mid- to long-term” and boost the value of global broadcast rights. With plans to make the international game an annual event LaLiga seems intent on pushing ahead with the changes.