Real demand Tebas resign over Goebbels comparison

Real Madrid have called for the "immediate resignation" of La Liga president Javier Tebas after he drew comparisons between the club's management and Nazi propaganda chief Joseph Goebbels.

Tebas said Real Madrid's communication and the use of its in-house TV channel "recalls propaganda mechanisms exploited by Goebbels".

Real Madrid have called the statement "deeply offensive" and "morally repugnant".

The club have also demanded Tebas steps down as both the head of the Spanish top flight and vice-president of the Spanish Football Association (RFEF).

"Real Madrid considers it absolutely intolerable and extraordinarily serious that someone holding two positions of utmost responsibility in Spanish football resorts to a comparison with the propaganda methods of the Nazi regime to discredit our club, its management and its television," the club said.

In a lengthy post published on X on Friday, Tebas said: "Real Madrid's management directs an orchestra of mouthpieces and Real Madrid TV leads the singing.

"Their score is always the same: select the plays that suit them, repeat the grievance, feed the suspicion, and point fingers at the enemies.

"That method recalls propaganda mechanisms exploited by Goebbels, Nazi Germany's minister of propaganda: systematic repetition, construction of an enemy, and subordination of facts to the narrative."

Tebas later said he was drawing comparison with "those propaganda techniques" and "not with an ideology".

Real Madrid rejected this clarification, saying it did not mitigate the "institutionally unworthy nature of his statements".

The club added: "These statements constitute yet another episode in the repeated attacks by Javier Tebas against Real Madrid, its president and its media outlets."

Last month, Tebas criticised Real Madrid for claiming there was a refereeing conspiracy against the club.

He also has been critical of Real and its president Florentino Perez in previous years after disagreeing with their plans to join a European Super League in 2021.

In 2025 he said Real had "lost their head" after the club sent a formal letter of complaint to the Spanish FA about officiating in the league.