REGION OF MURCIA / The Region hosts in November 18 ‘stages’ of football that will involve 3,500 overnight stays in the area of La Manga and Mar Menor

Source: CARM
A total of 10 European teams and 8 teams will be concentrated in the regional complexes taking advantage of the last FIFA stop of the year

The promotion of the Region as a destination for ‘stages’ of football is one of the priorities of the regional government within its strategy of promoting sports tourism

The Region of Murcia will host 18 ‘stages’ of football that will mean the arrival of 627 players to the regional complexes and 3,500 overnight stays distributed in 5 establishments in the area of ​​La Manga and Mar Menor.

Thus, a total of 10 European teams and 8 teams will be concentrated in the complexes Pinatar Arena and La Manga Club taking advantage of the last FIFA stop of the year, and will gather in the Region the young soccer promises of Europe and Asia.

Pinatar Arena will be the one that concentrates the most activity. Specifically, he will receive the Spanish men’s teams of Spain Sub18 and U19, Norway U19, England U18, Belgium U18, Netherlands U18, Ireland U18, China U18, Turkey U21 and Scotland U21, and the concentrations of 4 Scandinavian teams. In total, 500 footballers and just over 2,500 overnight stays.

In turn, La Manga Club will receive 4 teams from Norway’s U20 and U21 teams, France U20 and U20 Switzerland, with a total of 127 players, which will generate 991 overnight stays. Admission to all matches played by these teams will be free in both complexes.

The Minister of Tourism and Culture, Miriam Guardiola, said that «the fact that these teams establish their training base in the region is great , as they will directly contribute to increase occupancy in regulated regional housing in the middle season and low, will generate a greater number of stable jobs in the sector, reactivate the commerce and economy of the places of reception and position the Costa Cálida as the ideal destination for high performance sports and high technical training throughout Europe «.

Taking advantage of the expansion of the regional sports infrastructure (in the last year La Manga Club and Pinatar Arena has gone from managing 14 football fields to 18), the Community has set itself the target for 2018 to host 470 teams in the destination and a total of 13,250 athletes, which will generate 60,000 overnight stays, 5 percent more than the previous year.

The Minister of Tourism reaffirmed the commitment of the regional government for the formula Tourism + Sport = Success and highlighted the tourism of ‘stages’ within this binomial (which also includes golf and tourism of sporting events) and the coordinated work that is carrying out with complexes, federations, clubs and sports companies in order to continue promoting this tourist modality.