The thesis gaining strength in Negreira case: money recycled to Barça execs

On 21 February, a month and a half ago, Joan Laporta broke his silence on the Negreira case, uncovered six days earlier by Cadena Ser. That day, at Camp Nou, he announced two things: an investigation and an explanatory press conference on his part. The first of these initiatives is underway. On the second, there is still no news, despite the fact that the case has advanced to the point that a Barcelona court has accepted the complaint filed by the Public Prosecutor's Office.

During all these weeks, in which multiple details of the relationship between Barça and Enríquez Negreira between 2001 and 2018 have become known, Laporta has alleged a campaign against the club. All of this on the basis of a sentence that he has turned into the slogan of his defence before public opinion: "Barça have never bought referees".

Proven facts in the Negreira case

It is clear (because it has been proven) that Negreira received money from Barça, that a large part of the services he allegedly provided in exchange (advice and refereeing reports) lack documentary support and that the supplier was in those years vice-president of the RFEF's Technical Committee of Referees. But the thesis that the money, or part of it, ended up in the pockets of some referees to favour Barça on the pitch is losing strength.

Firstly, because despite the social pressure to which the collective has been subjected, not a single one of the dozens of First Division referees in those almost two decades has suggested that this practice existed. Neither by giving their name and surname to a confession nor by doing so anonymously. So far, not a single journalist following the case (and there are a great many of them) has published any information pointing in that direction. And there is not one who has not looked for it. Nor has the tax authorities found any evidence to that effect.

Estrada Fernández

Only Xavier Estrada Fernández, a Catalan and, therefore, never a Barça match referee, has broken the unity of the collective and it has been, precisely, to denounce Enríquez Negreira in court. His figure and his role in the case continues to generate controversy. The CTA is silent, so is he, and all around him theories are being put forward as to who is behind his movement, if there is anyone. There are those who see Barça's hand behind the referee, but it is only a conjecture. Like the one that says he wants to take revenge on the CTA and the RFEF because he knew they would not renew his contract for next season. Then, however, he will be a councillor of the Lleida city council for ERC if the May elections don't say otherwise.

Nor does it sit well with observers directly interested in the case that there is a big refereeing scam. In a league of 38 referees, they argue, a club would have to buy a large number of referees in order to ensure that they would behave in a way that would benefit their interests. And maintaining this 'omertà' for so many years borders on the impossible.

Negreira's role with CTA

And it cannot be overlooked that those who participated in those years in the refereeing establishment emphasise that Negreira's role was residual, that he neither participated in the assignment of referees nor decided on promotions and relegations, as he limited himself to informing those affected about them. And although this version raises doubts, it is clear that Negreira was a second-rate figure in the refereeing hierarchy.

So why did Barça, with four different presidents (Gaspart, Laporta, Rosell and Bartomeu) pay at least €7.2 million to Negreira? The thesis that has been gaining strength in recent days, based on the analysis of the documentation that the Public Prosecutor's Office made available to the court, is that the former vice-president of the CTA was a vehicle for Barça executives to receive, indirectly from the club's own coffers, bonuses in black money. Executives who, by statute, cannot receive a salary from the club.

The Tax Agency itself, in the report it sent to the Public Prosecutor's Office (and this, in turn, to the judge) already reflected that Negreira withdrew in cash 28% of the money he received from Barça between 2016 and 2018, the period initially investigated. An amount that rises to €557,871 in those years and that the Treasury believes could have gone to third parties linked to Barcelona, as reported by El Periódico de Cataluña, of the Prensa Ibérica group.

Josep Contreras

The role of the late executive Josep Contreras, intermediary and commissioner of the agreements between Barça and Negreira, reinforces this theory. According to this thesis, outlined by the Treasury in its report, the money that came out of Barça's coffers was shared between him, the former referee and, possibly, these third parties linked to the club. Some of Barça's main detractors are convinced that this was the case.

A priori, this possibility has two weaknesses. A refereeing official seems the least suitable person in the world to act as a vehicle to collect a salary in 'b', because in addition to the crimes of this practice, one can easily add the crime of sporting corruption, as is happening. If the front man had been someone else, Barça's participation in the next Champions League would not be at risk right now.

Agreement ended in 2018

But Negreira could have served as an alibi to justify the amount of those payments internally. "Barça wanted to make sure that no decisions were taken against the club, that everything was neutral," he told the Treasury. That would also serve to explain the second weakness in the theory of the overpayments: the suspension of the agreement in 2018. Because if Negreira was no longer vice-president of the CTA (Rubiales dismissed him as soon as he became president of the RFEF), paying him to "keep everything neutral" ceased to serve as an internal alibi at Barça.

The task of the Guardia Civil, to whom the judge has entrusted the investigation, is now to find proof and evidence to fit the puzzle together to find out if, as Laporta and many of his enemies claim, "Barça have never bought referees". And if any of the directors of those 17 years ended up keeping part of the money that Barça paid to Negreira for reasons that the club has not wanted to talk about.

Maybe at a press conference. One of these days...