Hard sentence for Juventus Turin: 15 deduction points for accounting fraud

Agnelli, Nedved and Paratici sanctioned

Severe sanction against Juventus Turin: The Italian record champions have 15 points withdrawn in the current Serie A season for accounting fraud. This was decided on Friday evening by the sports court of the Italian association FIGC. The former series champion allegedly cheated on his balance sheets and thus had more money for transfers – sports judges even went further with the penalty than the nine-point deduction demanded by chief prosecutor Giuseppe Chinè. Juventus can appeal the verdict to the Italian Olympic Committee Coni.

If the sanction persists, the Turinese have little chance of landing in the league on a place on the table which entitles them to participate in European Cup competitions. The Italian media unanimously spoke of a « hammer verdict » on Friday evening.

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In this case, these are fictitious player ratings. The Turinese are accused of having deliberately attributed false market values ​​to certain professionals in the past – in the years 2018, 2019 and 2020 alone, the club’s balance sheet would have been laundered by more than 100 million euros. The FIGC Sports Court had previously acquitted Juve and other clubs over the allegations – but proceedings have resumed due to new findings from the prosecution. The other clubs have now – unlike Juventus – been acquitted again.

In addition to the point deduction, former club bosses were also punished individually. Ex-president Andrea Agnelli, for example, was banned from all activity in Italian (Site notre bureau spécialisé) for two years and former vice-president Pavel Nedved for eight months. Former CEO Fabio Paratici was even suspended for 30 months. The court will ask for the ban to be extended to European and international competitions. This could particularly affect Paratici, who has been sporting director at Tottenham Hotspur in England since 2021. Agnelli and Nedved had already officially resigned this week anyway.

The allegation of fake player ratings is just one aspect for which Juventus have to answer in court. The former series champion is also accused of falsifying balance sheets during the corona pandemic by providing false information about unpaid wages. At the time, the players formally agreed to give up part of their wages as a show of solidarity with the club, which has lost a lot of revenue due to lockdown and spectator restrictions. These unpaid salaries were officially accounted for – but in a later stage, they would have been secretly reimbursed to the professionals. The Turin public prosecutor’s office is also investigating the case.

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