La Liga Oscars

Last night was the chance for Spanish football to honour the finest performers of the 2008/2009 season with the annual awards at the Ritz Hotel in Madrid. Proclaimed by sponsors Marca as the ´La Liga Oscars´, the ceremony did its best to emulate its American Film counterpart, with a fair amount of glitz and glamour to the occasion. La Liga´s new golden boy Cristiano Ronaldo will have been disappointed to have missed out, especially given the famously dubious nature of the newspaper´s awarding criteria (they recently presented Kaká with the Marca Legend Trophy for his spectacular career so far in football, curiously labelling it as his first trophy in Spanish football!). If Madrid end the season empty handed we can surely expect to see the inauguration of ´La Ligas Most Handsome´ award next year.

Not to be outdone this year though, the newspaper did manage to sneak one of their own into winning a category, with the gentleman on the far bottom-right, Megía Dávila, winning the ´Best Referee´ category. Regarded as one of the better spanish whistleblowers before his recent retirement, and a self-proclaimed Madrid fan, the club have recently employed him as an advisor to the first team squad on how to treat referees. Cue the predictable outrage from Barca fans who already had lists of 10 or so stonewall penalties he turned down when refereeing their matches.

Here is a list of the nights main ´oscar´ winners:

Diego Forlán (Athletico Madrid)  - Picichi Prize / Top Goalscorer
Victor Valdés (Barca)  - Zamora Prize / Keeper with least goals conceded
David Villa (Valencia)  - Zarra Prize / Top Spanish Goalscorer
Pep Guardiola (Barca)  - Migual Muñoz Prize  / Best Manager
Megía Dávila (Real Madrid)  - Guruceta Prize / Best Referee