Real Madrid forward Vinicius Junior has been subjected to various racism act in the past few months, with the Brazilian targeted on and off the pitch.
However, police in Spain have arrested four men accused of coordinating an online hate campaign that called for racial abuse to be hurled at the Real Madrid’s forward.
Police said on Thursday that the men, all in their 20s, had been detained as part of an investigation into social media posts that circulated days before Atlético Madrid took on Real Madrid in September’s derby.
The posts, which are believed to have had more than 1.5bn views, urged Atlético fans to attend the match wearing masks so that they could insult Vinícius without being identified.
“Using social media, they called on fans to show up at the stadium to hurl insults that had racist connotations,” the police said on social media. The online campaign swiftly gained strength, setting off “significant social alarm”, police added.
As the campaign made headlines across Spain, La Liga said it would lodge a formal complaint and demand that those behind the campaign be arrested. “The campaign constitutes a crime of incitement to hatred [which is] clearly typified in the penal code,” it said in a statement one day before the derby.
La Liga have reacted to news of the arrests.
“These acts do not go unpunished and have their consequences,” the league said in a statement, as it vowed to continue to fight hate and racism in football.
In June, three Valencia fans were sentenced to eight months in prison for hate crimes against Vinícius, in what La Liga described as the country’s first conviction related to racist abuse at a football match.
According to the police, the four arrests had been carried out in mid-October and that further arrests could be made because the investigation was continuing.
