La Liga president Javier Tebas has reiterated that he is keeping all options open in order to complete the current league season in Spain.
It follows a report Cadena Cope that the league are insistent on completing the full fixture list for the 2019/20 season but accept that many games must be played behind closed doors.
All sport in Spain was initially suspended for a fortnight due to the outbreak of the coronavirus, but the nation declared a state of emergency on 13 March which will provisionally last 15 days and is likely to be extended further.
“We are going to end the season, we are working on the times,” Tebas told Deportes Cuatro, as cited by El Mundo Deportivo. “There are several hypotheses: we hope to resume in April or May…I do not rule out that it may even be later. We are going to wait for what UEFA decides this Tuesday.”
Tebas added, in relation to player’s contracts: “Some legal, legal and labour mechanism must be in place that can allow players whose contract concludes on 30 June to continue competing in their current teams. Otherwise, the devaluation of the league starting from 1 July with different squads would be incomprehensible.”
The league chief also confirmed that matches would be played behind closed doors if necessary: “There is a long time to go before we can finish the competition, but we have to wait for UEFA because we have to defend the entire football ecosystem and not just the one in Spain, but in other competitions such as the Champions League or the rest of the nations. This is a shared problem.
“What losses would the league face? It would be around €700m to end La Liga and we have contracts with 100 businesses around the world.”
On Monday it was confirmed that Spain had overtaken South Korea as the nation with the most cases of the virus globally.
Spain now has 9,191 confirmed cases of coronavirus – a rise of 1,203 from Sunday – while it now has a recorded 309 deaths – up 15 in the same timeframe – with the nation now in a state of lockdown.
