Nota de Prensa
MIÉ 19.10.2022
LaLiga, Casa Árabe and the Cervantes Institute unveiled a football team made up of writers La Cervantina on October 11, which has been training this week at the ESC Centre, the flagship training complex in Madrid for LaLiga and its clubs, which also hosts LaLiga Academy Spain, the annual academic sports programme for young sportsmen and women from all over the world.
Part of the team of writers trained there this week under the guidance of coaches from LaLiga Grassroots, the club's global initiative to promote grassroots football. The group, which has had representatives such as Nacho Carretero, Carlos Marañón, Juan Córcoles and Alfonso López at the Centro ESC LaLiga & NBA, will play against a German team in Frankfurt on Saturday October 22, as part of the International Book Fair being held in that city. The match will take place after a meeting at the headquarters of the Cervantes Institute in the German city, as was officially revealed during the round table "Literature and Football" at the headquarters in Madrid, where the team was officially presented and it was announced that they would be responsible for participating in the match that the DFB Kulturstiftung, the cultural section of the German Federation, organises at each edition of the Book Fair, and which this year corresponds to Spain as the "guest of honour".
The partnership between the three organisations involves the development of different collaborative projects to further promote the values of sport and culture, with a special focus this year on Arab culture, against the background of the forthcoming World Cup in Qatar. The three-way collaboration kicked off with the unveiling of the "Football for Hope" umbrella project, which includes activities such as the forthcoming launch of a Spanish-Arabic football dictionary, republished for the occasion with the aim of promoting Spanish language and culture in MENA countries (countries in the Middle East and North Africa).
“Sport is not only a tool for social transformation, but also part of our culture. In our country, football has always been one of our greatest ambassadors, something that we at LaLiga have seen year after year since our internationalisation strategy was launched. We are now operating in more than 41 countries, where LaLiga is associated with the Spanish brand and, under its umbrella, football and culture go hand in hand. This aspect of promoting culture on an international level is part of the mission and values of the Cervantes Institute and Casa Árabe, which is why we consider ourselves natural allies,” states Octavi Anoro, International Director of LaLiga.
"For Casa Árabe it is an honour to support the promotion of culture, bringing a bit of Spanish culture to an international forum such as the Frankfurt Book Fair. Support for the Cervantina is part of the extensive "Football for Hope" programme on the occasion of the World Cup. This is the first time it has been held in an Arab country, and at Casa Árabe we are bringing a part of Arab society to Spain with exhibitions, activities and conferences," says Irene Lozano, Casa Árabe's Director General.
The intersection between culture and football is one of the reasons that LaLiga has been working all over the world for years as an ambassador of the Spanish brand. Furthermore, the signing of its agreement with Casa Árabe demonstrates its commitment to the Middle East and North Africa region, which has been one of the cornerstones of its international expansion, something that has been reinforced with the presentation of the new joint-venture in the region, which reflects this commitment to the future.
© LALIGA - 2022