Sid Lowe explicando a los británicos todo lo que aquí se cuece:
http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/2010/writers/sid_lowe/05/13/laliga.finalweekend/1.html
"... And the bottom
Miguel-Angel Revilla is the president of the Comunidad de Cantabria, one of Spain's smaller autonomous communities, up on the country's northern Atlantic coast. Its capital is the city of Santander -- home to the football team Racing Santander -- and this week, like most weeks, Revilla was deep in negotiation, busy trying to forge a pact with the opposition.
Nothing unusual there. The leader of the Cantabrian Regional Party, Revilla has spent much of his political life seeking alliances with more powerful players, scratching backs in order to have his scratched, pleading for support in difficult moments and promising payback in times of plenty. All, he would insist, for the good of Cantabria; all in the name of Santander.
But this week was a little different. This week, the men smothered in flattery and showered with gifts in his office, the men, women and children to whom he addressed himself in the papers, were not politicians. They were football fans. And, say Revilla's strikingly few critics, by extension they were also football players. Football fans from the neighboring Principality of Asturias, whose capital city is Oviedo and whose biggest city is Gijon -- home to football team Sporting Gijon.
On Monday, Revilla invited the Sporting Gijon supporters' club to his office in Cantabria and asked it to cheer on Racing Santander on Sunday evening. He then wrote an open letter to the media in which, deliberately and pointedly choosing an Asturian spelling of Gijon, he declared:
"I am Cantabrian and almost Asturian, from the old Asturias of Salinas, the land of Beato de Liébana [an eighth-century monk], the ideologue of the Kings of Asturias in the Reconquest [of Spain from the Moors]. The team of my heart will always be Racing Santander and my second team is Sporting de Xixón [sic.]. I believe I have the moral right to ask the Sporting fans to come to Santander on Sunday and cheer on my team. Today, you do it for me, tomorrow I will do it for you!"
Revilla can be assured of one thing: On Sunday, Sporting's supporters will indeed travel to Santander, because their team plays Racing. Revilla, though, wants them to support his team, not theirs. And the thing is, they might. The Sporting supporters' club has prepared scarves with Racing on one side, Sporting on the other and -- "jokingly," they insisted -- said they'd help out. Jose Maria Suarez Brana, president of the association of Sporting supporters' clubs, admitted, "Most fans don't see it as a bad thing to lose in Santander." Incredibly, neither, it seems, does much of the mainstream media.
The reason Sporting fans don't consider defeat such a bad thing is simple: Racing almost certainly will be relegated with a loss, while Sporting is already safe. "I'm not," Revilla added quickly, "asking any team to let itself be beaten. I am [just] asking the Sporting fans to cheer on Racing, as I would do if the tables were turned and they needed the points to survive. Last year, when Sporting were fighting for survival on the final weekend, I sent a letter to the newspapers in Asturias supporting them."
There's been speculation of a so-called "Pact of Llanes" in which representatives of Racing and Sporting agreed that, should either team really need the points on the final day, the other club would let itself be beaten. The rumors have been dismissed as baseless and there's no evidence to support them. And nothing should be made of the Sporting coach's history with Racing. After all, Manolo Preciado, a former defender with Racing Santander, has insisted it is not up to him to worry about Racing. This not a unique situation: Professionals come up against their former clubs all the time.
But Revilla's comments hardly help to dispel the innuendo and they have created a backdrop of suspicion, serving to inflame an already volatile situation. By speaking out, he may have done the club he tries to help no favors at all.
It's not just them, though. And that is surely the point: This isn't just one match, it is not just Racing versus Sporting. There are other teams' destinies in the balance. And some fans from other teams see little difference between asking a team's supporters to cheer the opposition and asking that team to let itself be beaten. Not least because their nerves are frayed, their heart is in their mouths and their future is bound up in what Racing and Sporting do.
Five teams could yet occupy the three relegation spots: Xerez is last with 33 points, while Tenerife, Malaga, Racing and Valladolid all have 36. If Racing does beat Sporting, Xerez is doomed whatever it does. Valladolid could find itself relegated even if it pulls off the miracle of winning in Barcelona, and the same could go for Malaga and Tenerife. All because of what happens in Cantabria when its neighbors visit from Asturias. And then the reaction would be inevitable.
Racing versus Sporting could well be the cleanest, most above-board match in history. However, try telling that to tearful Tenerife fans or furious supporters of Xerez, Valladolid and Malaga if Racing does eventually win and sends them down instead. The accusations may be unfounded or even faintly ridiculous, but by appealing to his "brothers in arms" this week, Revilla sadly ensured that, should Racing de Santander survive, the smell of suspicion will never go away. And in the future, it won't be just Sporting looking for payback."
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Las partes subrayadas:
"y esta semana, como la mayoría de las semanas, Revilla estuvo inmerso en negociaciones, ocupado tratando de forjar un pacto con la oposición"
"Ha habido especulaciones del también llamado "pacto de llanes" por el cual representantes del Racing y el Sporting llegaron a un acuerdo, en el que si un club realmente necesitara los puntos en la jornada final, el otro club se dejaría ganar".
Última edición por burgundio el Vie 14 Mayo 2010, 16:10, editado 1 vez
Re: Manifiesto por una competición limpia. No al pacto de LlanesMiér 12 Mayo 2010, 17:27
