60 Fun Facts About La Liga

How many teams contest La Liga each season?

Each plays the others home and away for 38 matchdays, from August to May.

By the end of the 2023-24 season, how many La Liga titles had Real Madrid won?

Real Madrid are the record champions; their two runs of five in a row, 1961-65 and 1986-90, are also a record.

How many different clubs have been crowned La Liga champions?

Sixty-three clubs have played in the division; Betis, Sevilla and Deportivo each won it exactly once.

Which director at Arenas de Getxo first proposed a national league for Spain in 1928?

The federation eventually settled on ten founding clubs for the 1929 season.

Which three founding clubs have never been relegated from the top flight?

Espanyol, Real Sociedad and Racing Santander were also among the ten founders.

How many clubs made up the first Primera División in 1929?

Six were picked as past Copa del Rey winners, three as cup runners-up and Racing Santander came through a knockout tournament.

Who scored seven goals in Athletic Bilbao's record 12-1 win over Barcelona in 1931?

Seven in a game has been equalled only once, by László Kubala for Barcelona in 1952.

Which Englishman coached Athletic Bilbao's title-winning 'first historic squad' of the early 1930s?

The bowler-hatted Pentland won four league titles and four cups in Bilbao.

Which Andalusian club won its only La Liga title in 1935?

The league was then suspended for the Spanish Civil War.

Atlético Aviación entered La Liga in 1939-40 as a replacement for which war-damaged club, then won the title?

Reinforced by a merger while rivals lost players to exile and war, they retained the title in 1941.

Which club won its only La Liga title in 1946?

They had finished runners-up in 1940 and 1942 during a brief golden era.

Barcelona's 1952 side is called 'the team of the five cups'. Which trophy was NOT one of the five?

The European Cup did not exist until 1955; the five were the league, Copa del Rey, Copa Eva Duarte, Latin Cup and Martini & Rossi.

Real Madrid beat the 1950s foreign-player limit by naturalising which Hungarian?

Together with Raymond Kopa and Paco Gento they won four titles in the second half of the decade.

How many La Liga titles did Real Madrid win between 1960 and 1980?

Only Atlético Madrid, with four titles in that span, offered a serious challenge.

Real Sociedad won their first two titles in 1981 and 1982. Which goalkeeper captained that side?

Athletic Bilbao followed with back-to-back titles in 1983 and 1984, four Basque titles in a row.

Which English manager led Barcelona to the 1985 title, their first since 1974?

It was only Barcelona's tenth championship at the time.

Which Mexican striker won four Pichichi trophies in a row with Real Madrid between 1986 and 1990?

His 38 goals in 1989-90 tied Telmo Zarra's single-season record and won the European Golden Boot.

Johan Cruyff's Barcelona 'Dream Team' won how many consecutive titles from 1991?

Cruyff won eleven trophies in eight years, a club record until Pep Guardiola broke it.

Which Dutch manager followed Cruyff's success by winning the 1998 and 1999 titles at Barcelona?

His squad included Luís Figo, Luis Enrique and Rivaldo.

Which club became the ninth different champion when it won the title in 2000?

Under Javier Irureta, they finished in the top three five times between 2000 and 2004.

Which manager led Valencia to league titles in 2002 and 2004?

Valencia also won the UEFA Cup in 2004 and had lost two Champions League finals under Cúper.

How many points did Real Madrid get in 2009-10, a then-record still short of Barcelona?

Barcelona took the title with 99 points that year.

Real Madrid's 2011-12 title under José Mourinho set which points record?

They also scored a record 121 goals; Barcelona matched the points total the following season.

Who coached Barcelona to the 100-point 2012-13 title?

It matched Real Madrid's tally of the previous year, the only two 100-point seasons in the league's history.

Atlético Madrid's 2013-14 title was their first since which year?

That 1996 side also won the club's only league and cup double.

Barcelona's 2014-15 forward line of Messi, Neymar and Suárez was known by what nickname?

That team became the first to win a second European treble.

Who managed Atlético Madrid to the 2020-21 title, their second in eight seasons?

He has been in charge since December 2011, making him the longest-serving manager in La Liga.

Which company became La Liga's title sponsor in 2023, replacing Banco Santander?

The second division is branded LaLiga Hypermotion under the same deal.

The Pichichi Trophy for the season's top scorer is awarded by which newspaper?

It is named after Athletic Bilbao striker Rafael 'Pichichi' Moreno and has been awarded since 1952-53.

How many matches must a goalkeeper play to qualify for the Zamora Trophy?

He must also play at least 60 minutes for a match to count; the minimum was 15 games when the award began in 1958.

The Zarra Trophy for the top-scoring Spanish player was first awarded in 2006 to whom?

It is named after Telmo Zarra, whose 251 league goals were a Spanish record for nearly six decades.

How many times did Telmo Zarra finish as La Liga's top scorer?

His 251 league goals were a Spanish record for nearly six decades, and his 81 Copa del Rey goals still are.

How many La Liga goals did Lionel Messi score, the all-time record?

He also holds the records for hat-tricks (36), assists (192) and goals in a season (50).

How many Pichichi trophies did Messi win, a record?

The previous best was five, shared by Di Stéfano, Quini and Hugo Sánchez.

Which goalkeeper shares the record for most La Liga appearances, 622, with Joaquín?

He played for Athletic Bilbao, Barcelona and Valencia and kept 233 clean sheets.

Who has scored the most La Liga penalties, 61?

He was also the fastest player to 150, 200, 250 and 300 league goals.

Which winger has won the most La Liga titles as a player, 12?

All twelve came with Real Madrid, alongside six European Cups.

Who holds the La Liga record for red cards, 21?

He also leads the yellow-card list with 194.

Who became the youngest goalscorer in La Liga history at 16 years and 87 days in October 2023?

The youngest player ever remains Luka Romero, who debuted for Mallorca at 15 in 2020.

Which Atlético Madrid goalkeeper went 1,275 minutes without conceding in 1990-91, the longest run in La Liga?

The team went 13 straight matches without conceding that season.

Which club has lost the most La Liga matches in history?

Athletic Bilbao hold the record for most draws, 737, and Real Madrid the most wins.

The fastest goal in La Liga history, after 7.22 seconds in 2008, was scored by whom?

It came for Real Valladolid against Espanyol.

Athletic Bilbao's cantera policy restricts the club to signing players from which region?

That takes in Biscay, Gipuzkoa, Álava and Navarre plus the three French Basque provinces.

The 'Real' in Real Madrid was granted by which king in 1920?

The club had been founded in 1902 as plain Madrid Football Club.

Barcelona's founder in 1899, Joan Gamper, was originally from which country?

The founding group also included Catalan, German and English footballers; the motto 'Més que un club' came later.

The 2000 transfer that turned El Clásico toxic saw which Barcelona vice-captain join Real Madrid?

On his return to the Camp Nou he was pelted with coins, a whisky bottle and, famously, a pig's head.

In the Seville derby, the club from the richer Nervión district plays at which stadium?

Their rivals play in Heliópolis with a more working-class following; the first derby, in 1915, finished 4-3.

The Basque derby between Athletic Bilbao and Real Sociedad is sometimes named after which motorway?

It links Bilbao and San Sebastián, capitals of Biscay and Gipuzkoa; the fixture was first played in 1909.

Where was the 2014 Champions League final, the first between two clubs from the same city, played?

They met again in the 2016 final in Milan, with Real Madrid winning both times.

The Camp Nou has been Barcelona's home since which year?

Its renovation is planned to lift capacity to 105,000, keeping it Europe's largest football stadium.

Which Argentine forward's disputed 1953 signing, claimed by both Barcelona and Real Madrid, ended with him in white?

He had impressed both clubs at Millonarios of Bogotá and went on to win two Ballons d'Or.

Who was the first La Liga player in a world-record transfer, from Barcelona to Inter in 1961?

The fee was £152,000; twelve years later Johan Cruyff arrived at Barcelona for a record £922,000.

Neymar's 2017 exit from Barcelona to Paris Saint-Germain set a world record of what fee?

Barcelona spent much of it on Ousmane Dembélé and, months later, Philippe Coutinho.

How many clubs are relegated from La Liga each season?

Two come straight up from the Segunda División and a third arrives via play-offs among third to sixth.

If two clubs finish level on points, what is the first tiebreaker in La Liga?

Only if that fails does overall goal difference come in; a fair-play table and finally a neutral-ground play-off are the last resorts.

Which bank's name was attached to La Liga as title sponsor from 2008 to 2016?

Santander took over in 2016 before the league rebranded again in 2023.

In 2015, La Liga was the first league with how many teams in the Champions League group stage?

Sevilla joined the four league qualifiers by winning the Europa League after a rule change.

Which club set a world transfer record in 1998 by signing Denílson from São Paulo?

The £21.5 million fee came 16 years after Barcelona had set the record by signing Diego Maradona.

In August 2021, La Liga clubs agreed to sell 10% of the league to which private-equity firm?

The deal was valued at about €2.7 billion.

Barcelona asked in 2007 for its 1937 title in which wartime competition to count as a Liga title?

The federation has never issued an outright decision on the request.