2010–11 La Liga

The 2010–11 La Liga was the 80th season of La Liga since its establishment. The campaign began on 28 August 2010, and concluded on 21 May 2011. A total of 20 teams contested the league, 17 of which already partook in the 2009–10 season, and three of which were promoted from the Segunda División. In addition, a new match ball – the Nike Total 90 Tracer – served as the official ball for all matches.
Defending champions Barcelona secured a third consecutive and overall 21st La Liga title following a 1–1 draw with Levante on 11 May 2011. The result gave Barcelona a six-point lead with two matches remaining which, combined with their superior head-to-head record against Real Madrid, ensured that they would finish top of the table. Barcelona led the table since defeating Real Madrid 5–0 on 23 November 2010. From that point onwards, they lost only one match en route to winning the title. Barcelona's Lionel Messi won La Liga's Award for Best Player for a third straight year.
The season was again dominated by Barcelona and Real Madrid, with second-place Madrid 21 points ahead of third-place Valencia. Having also faced off in the Champions League semi-finals and the Copa del Rey final, the top two rivals met four times over seventeen days, for a total of five meetings this season.

Teams

Real Valladolid, CD Tenerife and Xerez CD were relegated to the Segunda División after finishing the 2009–10 season in the bottom three places. Tenerife and Xerez made their immediate return to the second level after just one year in the Spanish top flight, while Valladolid ended a three-year tenure in La Liga.
The relegated teams were replaced by 2009–10 Segunda División champions Real Sociedad from San Sebastián, runners-up Hércules CF from Alicante and Levante UD from Valencia. Hércules returned to the highest Spanish football league for the first time after 13 years, while Real Sociedad and Levante terminated their second-level status after three and two years, respectively.

Stadia and locations

Team	Club home city	Stadium	Capacity
Almería	Almería	Estadio del Mediterráneo	22,000
Athletic Bilbao	Bilbao	San Mamés	39,750
Atlético Madrid	Madrid	Vicente Calderón	54,851
Barcelona	Barcelona	Camp Nou	99,354
Deportivo La Coruña	A Coruña	Riazor	34,600
Espanyol	Barcelona	Estadi Cornellà-El Prat	40,500
Getafe	Getafe	Coliseum Alfonso Pérez	17,700
Hércules	Alicante	Estadio José Rico Pérez	30,000
Levante	Valencia	Estadi Ciutat de València	25,534
Málaga	Málaga	La Rosaleda	28,963
Mallorca	Palma	Iberostar	23,142
Osasuna	Pamplona	Estadio Reyno de Navarra	19,800
Racing Santander	Santander	El Sardinero	22,271
Real Madrid	Madrid	Santiago Bernabéu	80,354
Real Sociedad	San Sebastián	Estadio Anoeta	32,076
Sevilla	Sevilla	Ramón Sánchez Pizjuán	45,500
Sporting de Gijón	Gijón	El Molinón	29,800
Valencia	Valencia	Mestalla	55,000
Villarreal	Vila-real	El Madrigal	25,000
Zaragoza	Zaragoza	La Romareda	34,596

Personnel and sponsorship

Barcelona makes a donation to UNICEF in order to display the charity's logo on the club's kit.

League table

Awards

La Liga Awards

La Liga's governing body, the Liga Nacional de Fútbol Profesional, honoured the competition's best players and coach with Awards.

Award

Recipient

Best Player

Top goalscorers

This is the list of goalscorers in accordance with the LFP as organising body.

Rank

Player

Club

Goals

Pichichi Trophy

The Pichichi Trophy is awarded by newspaper Marca to the player who scores the most goals in a season, according to its own rules to determine the goalscorer.

Rank

Player

Club

Goals

Penalties

Top assists

Rank

Player

Club

Assists

Zamora Trophy

The Ricardo Zamora Trophy is awarded by newspaper Marca to the goalkeeper with the lowest ratio of goals conceded to matches played. A goalkeeper had to play at least 28 matches of 60 or more minutes to be eligible for the trophy.

Rank

Player

Club

Goals
against

Matches

Average

Fair Play award

This award was given annually since 1999 to the team with the best fair play during the season. This ranking took into account aspects such as cards, suspension of matches, audience behaviour and other penalties. This section not only aims to know this aspect, but also serves to break the tie in teams that are tied in all the other rules: points, head-to-head, goal difference and goals scored.

Rank	Club	Matches								Total Points
1	Barcelona	38	95	1	1	–	–	–	–	100
2	Mallorca	38	90	1	3	–	–	–	–	101
3	Racing Santander	38	87	2	4	–	1³⁸	–	–	108
4	Hércules	38	94	3	3	–	–	–	–	109
5	Real Sociedad	38	81	0	0	–	2^{9, 37}	4 Milds^{3, 14, 23, 36}	–	111
6	Deportivo La Coruña	38	96	4	1	–	–	1 Mild²¹	–	112
7	Real Madrid	38	94	4	3	–	1⁵	–	–	116
8	Villarreal	38	95	3	2	–	2²⁵	–	–	117
9	Almería	38	99	1	3	–	3^{25, 29, 35}	–	–	125
9	Athletic Bilbao	38	105	3	3	–	–	1 Mild¹¹	–	125
11	Getafe	38	111	4	4	–	–	–	–	132
12	Sporting Gijón	38	110	2	3	–	2^{27, 35}	–	–	133
13	Atlético Madrid	38	104	0	5	–	3^{8, 13}	–	–	134
14	Espanyol	38	119	2	3	–	–	1 Mild³⁶	–	137
15	Málaga	38	104	3	3	–	1²⁰	3 Milds^{18, 25, 38}	–	139
16	Osasuna	38	112	4	2	–	–	3 Milds^{21, 36, 38}	–	141
17	Sevilla	38	102	3	3	–	2^{16, 28}	4 Milds^{4, 6, 33, 38}	–	147
18	Levante	38	125	0	3	–	2^{36, 37}	1 Mild³⁸	–	149
18	Valencia	38	130	4	2	–	1²⁵	–	–	149
20	Zaragoza	38	125	3	4	–	1⁸	1 Mild³¹	–	153

Source: 2010–11 Fair Play Rankings Season.

Sources of cards and penalties:,, and

Pedro Zaballa award

Real Madrid

Overall

Most wins - Barcelona
Fewest wins - Almería
Most draws - Sporting Gijón
Fewest draws - Real Sociedad
Most losses - Real Sociedad and Hércules
Fewest losses - Barcelona
Most goals scored - Real Madrid
Fewest goals scored - Deportivo La Coruña
Most goals conceded - Almería
Fewest goals conceded - Barcelona

Season statistics

Scoring

First goal of the season:
Fernando Llorente for Athletic Bilbao against Hércules.Last goal of the season:
Kennedy Bakircioglu for Racing Santander against Athletic Bilbao.

Hat-tricks

Player

For

Against

Result

Date

Reference

Discipline

First yellow card of the season: Noé Pamarot for Hércules against Athletic Bilbao First red card of the season: Matías Fritzler for Hércules against Athletic Bilbao

Attendances

FC Barcelona drew the highest average home attendance in the 2010-11 edition of La Liga.