Barcelona President Joan Laporta has hit out with a number of serious accusations against La Liga and their President Javier Tebas. He claims that due to the club’s refusal to sign the CVC deal, the Blaugrana are paying for it with a campaign against them, including one designed to take Barcelona out of the hands of their memebers.
Speaking first on the Negreira case, Laporta categorised that as an attempt to bring Barcelona down, and ultimately force them to sell the club into private ownership.
“The Negreira case is a campaign against Barca. You have to be self-critical, but it was something we inherited. Getting consultancy on refereeing is not a crime. Barca has never bought a referee, beyond the fact that perhaps we did not sufficiently value what it meant that the son of a former referee gave us advice. This has gotten out of hand, because there is an orchestrated campaign to end up with Barca, to transform Barca into a SAD [a private company],” Laporta told Onze, via Sport.
He attributed that to the decision of Barcelona not to sign up for La Liga’s CVC deal.
“I link the Negreira case is linked to the fact that we have not signed with CVC, fortunately, because it is mortgaging Barca for 50 years. It is a fund that has kept 10.95 percent of the clubs’ television rights. It is nothing but a loan. We did not see that it was an operation that could benefit us. Being in need, as we were, to save the club, what we did was sell 25 percent of our television rights for €686m and that has saved the club. We have not fixed it entirely, because we still have an operating deficit of 200 million that we are attacking with an austerity plan, but what we did consider was the contract with CVC.”
And said that Tebas himself benefitted from the deal personally.
“One of the conditions was that Tebas would stay, first for 15 years and then for eight. His salary doubles that of bank presidents.”
In Laporta’s words, Barcelona were threatened with repercussions in terms of how they could operate.
“They told us that if we did this deal he would give us fair play, 15 percent. He told us that if we didn’t sign [the deal] we couldn’t sign [players] or they would make it more difficult for us. This is in the courts. We said no and they put the squeeze on us.”
Something which the Barcelona President then went on to claim was not just down to their refusal to agree to the CVC deal, but also their Catalan identity.
“You come to the conclusion that Catalonia may be within the state, but even so, some cannot digest that Barcelona are an element of Catalanism, and they are trying by all means to take it off us. Thus, the gentlemen of La Liga, those of the CVC and other established powers, what they want is this, but let them know that we are going to keep us defending Barçc’s interests with every last drop of our blood. We do this because we love Barca.”
The accusations that Laporta makes are incredibly serious, and question the integrity of Spanish football. Laporta claims the matter is in the courts, but does not state specifically what – if he can back up the claims he makes, then it would cause an earthquake throughout Spanish football.