Racism in La Liga: Guardiola 'not optimistic' it can end soon

Amid the massive racism row in Spain, Manchester City manager Pep Guardiola has been forced to admit that the situation is something that he does not feel will improve drastically within a short period of time.

The City boss is a former FC Barcelona player and manager, and is intimately familiar with the workings of Spanish football and local culture. In recent weeks, Real Madrid's Brazilian forward Vinicius Junior has been at the centre of the controversy after he has been left to endure racist abuse since joining Los Blancos back in 2018.

However, things have only gotten worse as he played an increasingly more prominent role in the Real Madrid squad. All this came to a head last Sunday during a match against Valencia at the Mestalla stadium, when the entire stadium could be heard making "monkey chants" for most of the match.

To make things worse, Vinicius was sent off under controversial circumstances after an altercation with the opposing players. The VAR team failed to show the on-pitch referee how he was choked by a Valencia player before he swung his arm to defend himself.

Following the incident, Vinicius spoke out against La Liga and Spanish society in general for allowing racism to thrive. He also shared a montage of videos showing how he has constantly been enduring abuse from the stands in many stadiums across Spain, not just at Mestalla.

La Liga president hits back against criticism

Vinicius also said that unfortunately, as much as he loved Spain for being his second home, he could no longer defend it from earning a reputation of being a racist country. He also said that La Liga "belongs to racists."

In response, La Liga President Javier Tebas said that Spain is not racist and neither is the organisation that he leads, despite much evidence to the contrary. Guardiola contradicted this, saying that La Liga could learn from the Premier League where racism is punished more harshly. "Here they are so strict. They know what they have to do," said the City boss, despite admitting that the problem is also far from being eradicated in England and elsewhere in the world.

In fact, Vinicius is not the only victim of such abuse in top flight football. Those playing for English teams like Arsenal's Bukayo Saka and Brentford's Ivan Toney among many others, have been abused both online and on the pitch constantly as well. Even players who are not Black but of a different race like Tottenham's Korean star Son Heung-Min have experienced racially-charged abuse.

"Of course racism is a problem everywhere, not just in one specific place - everywhere we have [people] thinking we are better than our neighbours, we are better than the other one," said Guardiola. He said that he believes racism still exists everywhere, and it is not a situation unique to Spain or La Liga.

Therefore, he said that he is not optimistic that the noise around Vinicius and his plight could make a big difference in Spain in the immediate and long term future.

Just days after receiving ban, Valencia's punishment is reduced

The football community commended La Liga for taking action against Valencia after last Sunday's incident by closing the Mario Kempes stand for five games. The area was where Vinicius had a heated exchange with some fans during the match, although the racist chants were resonating throughout the stadium. Valencia was also ordered to pay a fine of £45,000.

However, just days later, the five-match ban has now been reduced to only three. Many already though that the entire stadium should have been closed due to the extent of the chanting, but La Liga took a soft stance by closing only the south stand. Now, they even reduced the ban duration. The fine has also been slashed to only £25,000 following a decision from The Court of Appeals.

At this point, Valencia even has an option of making another appeal to remove the ban altogether. Indeed, Guardiola may have known what he was talking about, with barely anything coming out of Real Madrid's complaints after what they experienced at Mestalla.