Real Madrid demands immediate resignation of LaLiga president Javier Tebas
Real Madrid has asked LaLiga president Javier Tebas to resign from his league and federation posts after he likened the club's TV channel to Nazi propaganda methods. The club's statement also tied the row to its complaints over the Negreira case.
Club demands Tebas step down
Real Madrid has demanded the "immediate resignation" of Javier Tebas as president of LaLiga and vice-president of the Royal Spanish Football Federation (RFEF). The club issued its statement on Friday, 16 October, a few hours after Tebas published a post on X comparing its communication methods with Nazi propaganda. Real Madrid argued that his conduct lacked neutrality, respect and impartiality, which it said was incompatible with his institutional roles. The club set out its position in a five-point communique, calling his remarks absolutely intolerable and of extraordinary gravity. It described his attacks as a plague on Spanish football and said such statements would be unacceptable in any European sports institution governed by principles of respect, neutrality and integrity.
Real Madrid CF demands his immediate resignation as president of LaLiga and vice-president of the Royal Spanish Football Federation.
Tebas's Goebbels comparison
The row started with a post Tebas published on X on Friday. He wrote that the club's leadership conducts an "orchestra of portacoces" in which Real Madrid TV takes the lead. In the same message he said the club's approach recalled propaganda methods attributed to Joseph Goebbels, the Nazi minister of propaganda, and he listed systematic repetition, the building of an enemy and the subordination of facts to a narrative. He added that the comparison concerned propaganda techniques rather than any ideology, and that it did not extend to the club's supporters. Real Madrid's statement treated the Goebbels reference as offensive regardless of that caveat.
Its score is always the same: select the plays that suit it, repeat the grievance, feed suspicion and single out enemies.
The Negreira case and the UEFA complaint
Real Madrid tied its response to the Negreira case, which the club said must be fully clarified. The statement said the club had taken the matter directly to UEFA to demand a full explanation of payments FC Barcelona made over several years to the vice-president of the Technical Committee of Referees. The club considered it grave that Tebas's remarks responded to repeated complaints made on its own television channel about the case. Real Madrid also asked LaLiga for transparency and regeneration, and said it would keep defending its rights and institutional standing.
Refereeing and scheduling disputes
La Vanguardia placed the row within the return of LaLiga after the international break and a run of recent clashes between the club and the league. Real Madrid TV had criticised the red card and four-match suspension handed to Vinícius after the Villarreal match, along with the scheduling of the league game against Valencia on 7 November. That fixture comes three days after the club's match against AEK in Athens. Tebas responded that the club cannot ask for changes to days, times and the calendar and then present every disagreement as proof that LaLiga harms it. SAPO reported that he also wanted the channel to air the scheduling requests the club filed and received, including ones linked to events at the Santiago Bernabéu under the superlicense.
What Tebas asked for
Tebas asked the club to disclose the full treatment it has received from LaLiga, not only the parts that suit its argument. He proposed that Real Madrid TV devote a programme to the club's requests and the answers it received. He mocked the channel's selective coverage in a line that closed his argument.
We will see if they dedicate to that record the same enthusiasm as to the videos of grievances.
His closing message said Real Madrid TV supplies the images while others write the headlines, and that everyone then repeats the same accusation.
