Year-long sentence for football fan who racially abused Real Madrid’s Vinicius Junior and Villarreal’s Samuel Chukwueze.
Vinicius Junior of Real Madrid called for Spain to be stripped of its 2030 World Cup hosting duties unless it makes progress on the issue of racism in sports stadiums
A Mallorca fan who racially abused Real Madrid star Vinicius Junior and former Villarreal player Samuel Chukwueze was sentenced to a year in prison and issued a three-year stadium ban on Thursday.
The supporter was “found guilty of two crimes against moral integrity, aggravated by the fact that he acted with racist motives”, Real Madrid said in a statement. The abuse of Vinicius occurred during Real Madrid’s 1-0 La Liga defeat by Mallorca at their Son Moix Stadium in February 2023, before the same fan insulted Chukwueze, now at AC Milan, a fortnight later.
Real Madrid said the football fan’s prison sentence was suspended “after the defendant apologised and showed his remorse, with a letter addressed to Vinicius, having completed an equality and anti-discrimination programme”.
It is the third criminal conviction handed down in recent months for racist insults towards Real Madrid players, in particular Vinicius, who has been the victim of numerous similar instances of abuse in stadiums across the country since arriving in Spain in 2018.
