Real Madrid presents Bolivian President with team shirt

Madrid March 17 (IANS) Bolivian President Evo Morales received a customised Real Madrid team shirt during a meeting with the Spanish football club boss Florentino Perez here.

The event took place at a Madrid hotel on Friday in which the Bolivian president is staying from where he travelled to the Zarzuela Palace in the capital s outskirts to meet with King Felipe VI reports Efe.

Perez participated in the event as Real Madrid s president not as the CEO of the ACS construction company since Morales is a keen football enthusiast.

Perez presented the Bolivian leader with a Real Madrid team shirt with a number 10 and his name inscribed on the back.

Morales and Perez had previously met in 2013 when the Real Madrid president invited him to visit the Santiago Bernabeu stadium where he spoke with team legends such as the late Alfredo Di Stefano and the team s current manager Zinedine Zidane.

The Real Madrid Foundation operates 10 football academies in Bolivia.

The five academies located in the Cochabamba region were inaugurated last June in an event attended by Morales and Real Madrid s director of institutional relations former player Emilio Butragueño.

After that event Morales and Butragueño took part in a football match with former players who were part of the Bolivian national team in the 1994 World Cup.

--IANS
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