Barcelona downplays payments for refereeing reports
MADRID — Barcelona denied a potential battle of curiosity on Wednesday for having made funds for technical studies on referees to an organization that belonged to the vice chairman of the refereeing committee in Spain.
The funds for info on how referees officiate had been produced from 2016-18 and totalled 1.4 million euros ($1.5 million), in accordance with radio station SER Catalunya. The station mentioned the corporate employed by Barcelona belonged to former referee José María Enríquez Negreira, who was part of the Spanish soccer federation’s refereeing committee from 1994-2018. The funds are below investigation as a part of a tax probe into the corporate.
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The Spanish federation famous that Enríquez Negreira left the committee after the brand new administration took over in 2018.
“The refereeing committee regrets behaviour that could be considered unethical,” the federation mentioned in a press release. “No active referee or member of the committee can participate in work that could be considered a conflict of interest.”
Enríquez Negreira instructed SER he by no means favoured Barcelona whereas assigning referees to matches, and that his job was solely to assist the membership verbally about how gamers ought to conduct themselves earlier than every referee.
Getting studies on referees is frequent apply and golf equipment will pay different firms or have them ready internally. It’s not recognized if different golf equipment additionally acquired them from the corporate of the previous referee.
Barcelona mentioned the “technical reports related to professional refereeing” and were ordered “in order to complement the information requested by the first and second team coaching staff.”
The membership mentioned reviewing studies on referees is “a typical apply amongst skilled soccer golf equipment.” They are at present ready internally at Barcelona as an alternative of being outsourced, the membership mentioned.
Barcelona president Joan Laporta mentioned the news concerning the funds was launched now to attempt to destabilize the staff’s good run. The Catalan membership will go for its twelfth win in a row in all competitions when it hosts Manchester United within the Europa League on Thursday.
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“Barcelona is sorry that this information has been released precisely when the team has hit its best form of the season,” the membership mentioned. “Barcelona shall be taking legal actions against those who are trying to tarnish the club’s image with possible insinuations against its good reputation that could be caused by the release of such information.”
Barcelona coach Xavi Hernandez additionally defended the membership.
“We always analyze the referees, we want to know who is refereeing, if they are communicative or not,” he mentioned. “It’s been like that for years. It’s not new.”
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