FC Torrevieja invite Linfield to play next season

One of Northern Ireland’s top football teams has received an invite from FC Torrevieja to visit the city and play a pre-season friendly next year.

Jeff Scott, commercial director of FC Torrevieja was at a Linfield game with last Tuesday night and held initial talks with Linfield chairman Jim Kerr.

"We are a very progressive club," said Jeff. "We want to bring top clubs over and Linfield fall into that category. We are full -time but I believe the standard we play is similar to that of the Irish Premier League. Last season we had Accrington Stanley over to the Vicente Garcia stadium and it was a fantastic venture. We would love to see Linfield come over and play an exhibition game and because of a huge English influence in the area I think it would generate a lot of interest. Initial talks have been held and it is now a case of keeping in touch and seeing just when we can get a date that would suit both parties."

With the availability of flights from Belfast to both Alicante and Murcia during the summer, many Linfield supporters are already looking at the possibility of visiting Torrevieja.

Linfield chairman Jim Kerr admitted it was an interesting prospect. "I met Jeff at Windsor Park and he put his plans of a game to me. It is an interesting invitation but at this stage it would be very much on the long finger. However, you can never rule anything out. The fact they want Linfield FC to play in an exhibition match shows the esteem in which the club is held."

Having been promotion contenders last season, Torrevieja’s form has been poor to date this year and they presently languish mid-table while Linfield are top of the League and hoping to qualify to play in Europe next year. Torrevieja have their own goals too. "We have a target of eventually playing in La Liga and that could be an eight year project, but we are thinking big," added Jeff. "We are planning a new stadium on the present site which is very exciting and well underway."

Don’t be booking your vacation plans just yet but here to hoping that we’ll see another great pre-season friendly in Torrevieja in 2010 if Linfield do make the trip.

Keith Nicol

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