BARCELONA, Spain — Barcelona, the crew that after awed the soccer world with its lovely model on the sector and its social dedication to being “greater than a membership,” is in peril of tarnishing its status with a scandal of its personal making.

Though the membership denies doing something incorrect, a Spanish state prosecutor is probing Barcelona’s cost of thousands and thousands of {dollars} over a number of years to an organization that belonged to the vp of the refereeing committee in Spain.

Spanish soccer has been reeling for the reason that story damaged by radio station SER Catalunya earlier this week mentioned Barcelona had paid 1.4 million euros ($1.5 million) from 2016-18 to an organization belonging to former referee José María Enríquez Negreira, who was part of the Spanish soccer federation’s refereeing committee from 1994-2018. Barcelona says the cash was for techincal stories on referees and youth gamers. These funds, which have but to be linked to any unlawful or improper exercise by the membership, got here to gentle as a part of a tax probe into the corporate.

In response to that preliminary report, Barcelona issued an announcement saying it was “conscious of the investigations into funds of exterior firms.” The membership mentioned it had employed the corporate as an exterior advisor to provide “stories in video format of youth gamers from different golf equipment in Spain” and for “stories associated to skilled refereeing.”

Getting stories on referees is frequent apply and golf equipment pays different firms or have them ready internally, as Barcelona now does. It’s not identified if different golf equipment additionally bought them from Enríquez Negreira’s firm.

However new stories of much more cash flowing from Camp Nou’s coffers to Enríquez Negreira emerged Friday in main Spanish newspapers El Pais and El Mundo.

In response to El Pais, the funds by Barcelona to Enríquez Negreira reached 7 million euros ($7.5 million) and began again in 2001. In that case, that may imply Barcelona stored paying Enríquez Negreira throughout totally different membership presidents, together with from 2003-10 underneath the primary time period of present president Joan Laporta, who once more took cost in 2021.

In the meantime, El Mundo reported that Enríquez Negreira had threatened then-Barcelona president Josep Bartomeu to create a “scandal” when the membership determined to cease paying for his firm’s providers in 2018.

In an interview with Spanish newspaper ABC on Friday, Bartomeu mentioned he ended the contract with the corporate to scale back prices and that the membership by no means tried to hunt favor from referees. He added that in alternate for the cash the membership obtained referee stories “in written kind and in DVD” for each recreation for its first crew and its “B” crew.

“It appears to be like like with this service we had been asking for extra penalties in our favor or that we wished to situation the referees’ choice, however it’s not true. This particular person (Enríquez Negreira) had zero energy of the referees,” Bartomeu mentioned.

Former membership president Joan Gaspart, who ran Barcelona from 2000-03, when the funds allegedly began, has denied any data of them.

Barcelona instructed The Related Press it has began its personal investigation with exterior assist to “assure most effectivity.”

The state prosecutors workplace wouldn’t verify the data revealed by El Pais and El Mundo when requested by the AP. It restricted its response to saying that official investigations have been ongoing for months.

Laporta has defended his membership and mentioned it’s “not a coincidence that this comes out now when the issues are going properly for the crew,” which leads the Spanish league and is in search of its first league title since 2019.

The Spanish soccer federation and its referee committee have mentioned that they are going to absolutely collaborate with the investigation. The federation mentioned Enríquez Negreira has had no position within the group because it modified administration in 2018.

Luis Medina, who refereed from 1998-2009 and is now head of the committee that assigns referees to video games, mentioned this was a horrible second for his guild.

“I’ve been concerned in refereeing for 40 years and that is the saddest second I’ve gone via,” Medina mentioned Thursday, including “I’ll put each my fingers within the fireplace for each era of referees which have given it their all on the sector.”

Medina mentioned whereas he was actively refereeing he by no means obtained any stress of any sort from Enríquez Negreira or anybody else to affect a consequence or favor a crew. He mentioned Enríquez Negreira had a minor position and that “he was a person within the shadows, and we didn’t know precisely what his tasks had been.”

League president Javier Tebas mentioned sporting sanctions resembling lack of factors or relegation wouldn’t be potential if any wrongdoing had been confirmed as a result of a three-year statute of limitations has already lapsed. Separate corruption fees, which might be prison fees, would rely upon the end result of the investigation being carried out by prosecutors.

Even so, the potential reputational harm might threaten to additional mar the picture of a membership that rose to the highest of the game underneath Lionel Messi and Pep Guardiola greater than a decade in the past.

Again in 2006, Laporta agreed to pay Unicef, the United Nations Youngsters’s Fund, to turn into the primary sponsor title on Barcelona’s shirt whereas spurning profitable offers, thus including socially-minded luster to the profitable membership. However in recent times the Catalan membership has been mired in scandals and the poor administration of Bartomeu’s board, which left it so closely indebted that it might now not pay Messi’s wage.

Present Barcelona coach Xavi Hernández, a number one participant for the membership from 1998-2015, defended the dignity of the membership and its gamers.

“I’m a good particular person and I wish to win video games on the sector,” Xavi mentioned after Thursday’s 2-2 draw with Manchester United within the Europa League. “If I see that we cheat to win, I am going residence.”

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