Is it a huge scandal about to explode over FC Barcelona? The revelations since last week of secret payments from the Catalan club to the vice-president of the technical committee of referees from 1994 to 2018 are causing deep unease in Spain.
What do we blame Barcelona for?
According to information from the Spanish newspaper The country, Barcelona would have paid almost 1.4 million euros over three years to Enríquez Negreira, for “verbal reports”. It would be several payments, of 532,728.02 euros in 2016, 541,752 euros in 2017 and 318,200 euros in 2018 (in total €1,392,680.02).
It all started after an inspection for irregularities found in the taxes of José María Enríquez Negreira between 2016 and 2018. Negreira was accused of not providing “no document proving that he provided a service to FC Barcelona” while he held his position on the referees’ committee. But this figure of 1.4 million may be underestimated.
The newspaper The world released new revelations last Friday claiming that the Catalan club had, in fact, paid more than €6m since 2001 to Jose Maria Enriquez Negreira. The latter defended himself by arguing that he had never favored Barcelona in his decisions or refereeing appointments for the Catalans’ matches. And that his job was to verbally advise them.
The former referee claims to have only recommended to Barca how his players should behave in front of each referee. “Everything was neutral,” he defended himself before the Tax Agency. He also indicated that he worked exclusively for FC Barcelona, which tends to prove from the turnover of his company, close to the payments made by Barça.
How is Barcelona defending itself?
The club spoke through a simple press release where they claim that they have in the past hired the services of an external technical consultant. This “provided, in video form, technical reports on young players in Spain for the technical secretariat of the club”. In the rest of the press release, the club affirms that this service “has been extended by technical reports relating to professional refereeing with the aim of supplementing the information required by the management staff of the first and reserve teams, a common practice in professional football clubs.
How are Barca’s opponents reacting?
Two first clubs came out of silence. Sevilla FC and Espanyol, the other Barcelona club, expressed their serious concerns via two press releases. “Although still in the investigation phase, the possible implications of what has been published for our competition, the clubs that make it up and the bodies affected would be so serious that exceptional action is necessary to clarify what is. really happened, writes Espanyol Barcelona. And, where appropriate, discharge the corresponding responsibilities at the national and/or international level. »
Sevilla FC has equally heavy words. “The seriousness of the facts known to date, which call into question or cast doubt on the integrity of Spanish football competitions, also leads Sevilla FC to publicly request to promote and participate in all the procedures that may arise from this case once the investigation is completed”.
What is Barcelona at risk?
Very big according to Javier Tebas, the boiling boss of La Liga, the Spanish Professional League. “I don’t know if the results of the matches were directly affected,” he said at a press conference. But for the image of La Liga, I don’t like it. La Liga cannot remain passive in the face of the clues we have in the press”. Adding that “the investigation must go to the end (…) because all this is doing a lot of harm to Spanish football. »
Tebas clarified that Barcelona’s sporting results will not be in question as they are time-barred. But that they were “not in the criminal”. Javier Tebas also explains that he “never noticed anything suspicious” in the matches he had seen: “It’s very complicated to cheat in the refereeing world. In addition, today, with television…” But he added that it was “not necessary that the attempted corruption worked for it to be reprehensible”.
This Monday, the president of the Spanish League also invited his Barça counterpart Joan Laporta to resign if he was unable to provide an explanation. The scandal is just beginning.