Real Madrid And Real Betis Share Double Guard Of Honor

Guards of honour have become more commonplace in recent years after a team has wrapped up the title before the end of the season, but Friday night in La Liga provided the rarely seen double guard of honour.

It's not always been the case that an opposing side has stood to show respect as the newly crowned champions come onto the pitch but we do see it more often these days.

Normally it comes just one game after the title win but in Spain this year Real Madrid have already been champions for nearly three weeks, winning the title in a 4-0 win over Espanyol last month, not that Gareth Bale was there to celebrate it.

Their next league game was against Atletico Madrid and, perhaps completely unsurprisingly, Diego Simeone's team did not give them a guard of honour.

However, on Friday night they more than made up for it when facing Copa del Rey winners Real Betis, with each team giving the other the ceremony of respect before kick off.

First Carlo Ancelotti's team came on the pitch, lined up in two lines to allow Betis players to walk between them and when they went through they then formed their own two lines for the league champions to walk through. The ultimate 'class this' gesture.

It's not too often that the cup winners get their own guard of honour, it's certainly not something we see in England very often, especially with the FA Cup usually played after the league has finished.

Manuel Pellegrini's side won the Copa del Rey back in April, even before Real had been named league winners, when they defeated Valencia.

The two sides needed to be separated by penalties and the win gave the Seville based side their first silverware since 2005, when they last won the cup.

Despite the rare sight of the double guard of honour, it's not actually the first time it's been done in Spain, with Barcelona and Sevilla sharing one in 2006, when Sevilla won the Europa League, though the pair did not do the same 10 years later.

The match on Friday was not exactly the entertaining game that the double guard of honour deserved, with no goals to celebrate for either team.

The two sides shared just five shots on target for the 90 minutes, as their league campaigns fizzled out in hardly the most exciting of fashions.

Real of course had one eye on their upcoming Champions League final with Liverpool in a week's time, although Ancelotti did play a strong team.

After the 0-0 draw, there could be another knock to Los Blancos ahead of that huge game, with Kylian Mbappe now expected to confirm he'll be staying at PSG for next season, rather than move to the Bernabeu, with that announcement sometime this weekend.