BarcelonaOnly 24 hours after Real Madrid announced that it would take action against Barça after the Prosecutor’s Office accused it of having “favored” itself by paying the former vice-president of the Technical Committee of Referees (CTA) José María Enríquez Negreira , the Spanish government is also involved. The president of the Superior Sports Council (CSD), José Manuel Franco, has confirmed that the State will act against Barça through the body he directs. Franco has confirmed this to Telecinco: “When the complaint is accepted for processing, it will be the time to get involved in the case”.
On Friday, the public ministry already presented to the court of inquiry number 1 of Barcelona the complaint for the Negreira case, which is added to the individual complaint of the Catalan member Xavier Estrada Fernández, who acts as a VAR referee. After almost a year of investigation, the public ministry concluded that until 2018 the club paid 7.3 million to Negreira to “favor” the entity “in the decision-making of the referees in the matches played”. The complaint is directed against Negreira, former Barça presidents Sandro Rosell and Josep Maria Bartomeu, Barça – as a legal entity – and two former club executives, Òscar Grau and Albert Soler. Among the crimes attributed to them are corruption between individuals in the sports field, disloyal administration and document falsification.
The public ministry has also requested, according to progress The country and the ARA has been able to confirm that the judge will call former Barça coaches Luis Enrique Martínez (2014-2017) and Ernesto Valverde (2017-20) to testify as witnesses. The complaint includes the two technicians in the list of witnesses so that they can explain whether, during their time at the head of the Blaugrana first team, they knew of the existence of alleged reports about the referees’ behavior on the field of play.
Joan Laporta breaks the silence and explodes
This evening, in a private Barça event attended by all the captains of the club – of the football teams and of the sections -, Joan Laporta exploded. “I really want to face all the shameless people who are staining our shield”, he said, moved, after having to stop his speech by shedding some tears. Earlier, he had started by affirming that the whole thing is an orchestrated campaign against Barça. “Some, motivated by envy, are trying to erode our reputation with campaigns made in bad faith. And you can be sure that we will defend the board that I have the honor of chairing with all our strength.”
Laporta has also been resounding stating that: “Barcelona sentiment is neither bought nor sold, but it is also not tarnished. And, recently, there have been some fierce attacks to tarnish our shield that have nothing to do with reality.” . Thus, the Barcelona president breaks his silence. His last recent communication was limited to one tweeted on his Twitter profile this Sunday, after Real Madrid announced that it would take part in the cause. “Culers, be calm. Barça is innocent of what it is accused of and the victim of a campaign against its honorability in which everyone is now involved. No surprise, we will defend Barça and demonstrate the club’s innocence. Many will to rectify”.
There are unlikely to be any short-term consequences
When the court proceedings are opened it is unlikely that there will be imminent sanctions for the club, according to some criminal lawyers consulted by the ARA. The consequences could only come in the long term and in the event that there was a conviction. However, there is a consensus to point out that the process will be very long and that these cases of alleged corruption are very difficult to prove: it is not the accused who have to defend their innocence, but the accusations which have to prove their guilt. In short, Barça can continue to compete without obstacles.
This does not remove the discredit and hostility to which the team is and will be subjected in football stadiums. Since the scandal came to light and has been getting bigger, Barça has already seen how at the Santiago Bernabéu and this Sunday in San Mamés, part of the rival fans were throwing fake tickets to represent the purchase of referees . In the white light were 500 euro bills with the face of Joan Laporta. In the stadium of the Basque team, they added the term mafia.
In the match against Athletic Club, the goal of the home tie canceled by hands after the VAR review and with the referee Jesús Gil Manzano going to the monitor to finish his decision unleashed the fury of the hobby “I’m surprised by this hostility, I’m sad, judging prematurely I think it’s not good for society, I’ve always been treated very well here. I respect that, but I’m sad. We don’t talk about it in the dressing room, our obligation is to defend the team to death and that’s enough,” said Xavi Hernández in a press conference.
Even in Seville, at the Sánchez Pizjuán stadium, there were protests over the Negreira case despite Barça not playing there. Tickets were also thrown, especially from the area of the most radical fans, the Biris Norte, and they hung a banner with the slogan: “For clean football”. Sevilla, with a statement asking to clarify the facts, was one of the first clubs to take a public position when SER Catalunya uncovered the case.
The day Florentino Pérez cornered Iturralde González
Although Barça is in the eye of the hurricane, former referee Iturralde González, with seventeen years of experience in the First Division, revealed to Cadena SER, of which he is a collaborator, an episode of pressure receipts from Florentino Pérez in the 2010-11 season. “Investigate who wanted to lock me alone in a separate room. And I said: ‘No, with my assistants’. I thought he was joking. He said: ‘I only ask that you whistle us the same as at Barça “. I told him that the conversation was over. It was Mr. Florentino Pérez. Half an hour later the Technical Committee of Referees knew about it. There was the report, there was no sanction. I will not hide because this happened, there is no corrupt referee, we are above these people…”.