Ahead of the next season of the Spanish La Liga, Spain’s health minister, Santiago Illa has said that he is unsure if fans will be able to return to football matches in the country.
La Liga returned to action behind closed doors on 11 June and Real Madrid has emerged winners of the title after beating Barcelona to it this time around after eight years.
Although the government’s Department for sport and La Liga had hoped for fans to return at a reduced capacity, the threat of another spike of the deadly corovirus is preventing the move. This is because there is no reliable vaccine for it yet.
Fans might not return to watch La Liga with realities on the ground
Speaking on radio station Cadena, Illa said he doesn’t see that happening with the realities on the ground.
“We have seen some clusters of infections and, although we have fortunately been able to control them, I still don’t see [fans returning].
“We’re going to take our time and provide information so the sports department can make the decision when necessary,” added Illa.
While calling for caution on the call for the recall of fans to stadiums, he said the government has to step carefully with the virus, adding that having large numbers of people at this time is not advisable.
It could be recalled that La Liga president, Javier Tebas had at a time wish to have fans back to the stadium even in a reduced capacity of 50 percent, but the recent numbers are bot encouraging the government to take any risk.
With tourists still ignoring the country’s compulsory COVID-19 measures, there could be another spike of the deadly virus and the consequences could be severe.
Spain currently has over 259,000 confirmed cases after recording an additional 1,361 in the last 24 hours, with the country’s death toll standing at 28,416.
