Chinese State TV Drops La Liga Matches After an Mbappé Joke; Perth Sunday League Team Says Its Jokes Have Never Got Anything Cancelled, Apart From Its Own Christmas Night Out
The broadcaster stopped showing Spanish football after a joke by the Real Madrid star, despite apologies all round.
A television showing football, which, in this case, it isn't. Photo: Frankie Roberto, “Football match in cinema”, via Wikimedia Commons, Public domain
China’s state broadcaster CCTV has stopped showing Spanish La Liga matches after Kylian Mbappé made a joke about a meme, despite apologies from the player, Real Madrid and La Liga. It did not show Real Madrid’s 3-0 win over Racing Santander on Sunday.
In Perth, the story has been followed with interest by a Sunday league team that knows a thing or two about jokes going wrong.
“We told a joke at the Christmas night out in 2019, and the hotel cancelled us for 2020,” said the club’s secretary. “Then 2020 got cancelled for everybody anyway, so we’re not sure it was the joke. But we’ve not been back.”
The team’s striker said he was “amazed one joke could stop a whole football league being shown”. “I’ve told hundreds of jokes during matches,” he said. “Mostly to the referee. They’ve never stopped anything. Usually they just get me booked.”
A pub on the South Street said it would continue to show La Liga for anyone who wanted to watch it. “Both of them,” said the barman. “There’s two. They sit at the end of the bar. Very nice lads. They’ll be fine.”
The Perthetic has decided not to make any jokes about this story whatsoever, just in case, and is instead printing a photograph of a television.
The real story: CCTV pulls La Liga matches (BBC News)
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