Alleged Bribery Of Referee Which Dragged Barcelona's Name Into Serious UEFA's Attention

UEFA responded seriously to the case that dragged Barcelona's name. (Photo: Twitter/@UEFA)

JAKARTA - UEFA President Aleksander Ceferin has called the refereeing scandal involving Barcelona one of the "most serious" situations he has ever seen.

UEFA is currently conducting an investigation into allegations of bribes made by Barcelona to Jose Maria Enriquez Negreira, former vice president of the refereeing committee in Spain.

Reports claim that Barcelona handed over 7 million euros worth of money from 2001 to 2018. The newspaper El Pais reported that the Negreira company provided written reports and DVDs of the referee's assessments for Barcelona before matches.

Barcelona maintained their innocence over the allegations. The reason is, prosecutors are only pursuing charges against the Catalan club on suspicion of corruption.

The president of La Liga, Javier Tebas, admitted that his party could not sanction clubs because of the restrictions in force. However, Ceferin insists there is no such limit for UEFA.

He then emphasized how important this case was. "The situation is very serious," Ceferin told the Slovenian newspaper Ekipa.

"In my opinion, this is one of the most serious (situations) in football I have ever seen," he continued.

However, Ceferin could not comment directly on this case. There were two things that prevented him from doing that.

"Firstly, because we have an independent disciplinary committee in charge of this. And secondly, because I haven't dealt with this matter in detail," said Ceferin.

"At La Liga level, of course, this matter is time-limited and has no competitive consequences, but the process is ongoing at the prosecutorial level. But as far as UEFA is concerned, there is no time limit."