Two games missing from CCTV
The Liga suspension announced earlier this week has now shown up on the schedule. Chinese state television did not broadcast the first two Liga games of the weekend, after announcing it was suspending coverage of the Spanish league over Kylian Mbappé’s remarks about Mao Zedong.
The first was Villarreal against Espanyol, played on Friday night in Spain. It was the first match on the calendar since Tuesday’s announcement, and the CCTV network, controlled by state broadcaster CMG, did not show it. On Saturday, Atlético Madrid against Levante, which kicked off at 13:00 GMT, was not available on CCTV either. Neither game had been listed in the channel’s broadcast schedule.
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Migu carried one of them
The blackout is not total. AFP journalists found that Villarreal-Espanyol was still available on the streaming platform Migu, a service run by China Mobile, which is also state-controlled.
LaLiga told AFP that Chinese television had so far shown every game of the Spanish league live.
A key market for La Liga
The row began earlier this week with a video in which the Real Madrid forward discusses a meme about himself, linking him to a “Chinese dictator”, in reference to edits that put his face on famous images of Mao. Three companies cut their contracts with him on Tuesday, and CCTV then announced it was suspending Liga broadcasts.
La Liga, for whom China is a key market, said it “deplored” Mbappé’s remarks. He has since apologised, saying he is “sincerely sorry”, and Beijing said it takes the apology seriously. Even so, state television did not show these two games.
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