La Liga chief uses Irish clubs as a poor example to defend El Clasico’s tax advantage

Robert Redmond

This is the weakest defence we’ve seen since Joe Hart’s rubber wrist attempted to keep out Kolbeinn Sigthorsson’s shot.

Real Madrid and Barcelona are among five La Liga clubs that have been ordered by the European Commission to repay the Spanish government money after it was ruled they had been provided financial aid.

According to the executive arm of the European Union: “public support measures granted by Spain to seven professional football clubs gave those clubs an unfair advantage over other clubs in breach of EU State aid rules.

“As a result, Spain has to recover the illegal state aid amounts from the seven clubs, namely FC Barcelona, Real Madrid, Valencia, Athletic Bilbao, Atlético Osasuna, Elche and Hercules.”

One of the instances the European Commission took issue with was the sale of land by Real Madrid to the Madrid City Council, deeming it to be overvalued by €18.8m and have ordered the club to pay the money back.

The commission also ruled that Spain had effectively created a tax shelter for Real Madrid, Barcelona, Athletic Bilbao and Osasuna, by allowing them to be classified as non-profit organisations. This enabled them to pay a tax rate five percent lower on profits than those paid by limited liability companies.

Real Madrid have said they will appeal the ruling, but they should probably avoid Javier Tebas’ line of defence if this is the best argument he can offer.

La Liga chief Tebas on EC claiming Barca & Madrid tax advantage: "Irish clubs pay just 12%, which generates unfair competition thru-out EU."

— Dermot Corrigan (@dermotmcorrigan) July 5, 2016

The La Liga president said that the ruling against the clubs’ non-profit status was “incredibly silly” because “Irish clubs pay just 12 percent (on profit),” and this “generates unfair competition throughout the EU.”

According to Tebas, Irish football clubs, that struggle to make any profit at the end of the year, are the real villains in this instance.

Hopefully the European Commission go after Irish clubs and end their dominance of European football, achieved through a low-tax rate, that is forcing the Spanish government to prop up the minnows of La Liga.