Juve case: the players also tremble

Many of Juventus’ financial problems, which have led to the situation these days, began with the decision to sign Cristiano. The investment of 100 million for his transfer and, above all, the 60 gross that his salary cost greatly complicated the juventino balance: the movements in the market of the last three years caused today’s trials for alleged fictitious capital gains and accounting fraud. A year and a half ago, the Portuguese left Italy, but his case is still in the news and is essential for the Turin prosecutors, since one of the keys to the Prisma investigation is the famous ‘Cristiano’s secret letter’.

Its content was fully disclosed by ‘Corriere della Sera’, a newspaper that also published the conversation on the subject between the club’s lawyer, Cesare Gabasio, and the sports director Federico Cherubini: “Theoretically, it should not exist”. In the document, Juve promised to return to the player the salaries that he supposedly gave up, also in the event of his goodbye to the entity, something that happened in the summer of 2021. Between Juve and Cristiano, then, now there would still be 19.6 million euros pending, a debt that, for Turin prosecutors, never appeared on the balance sheets. And there is more.

According to ‘La Repubblica’, CR7’s lawyers are considering filing a civil party against Juventus, whose journey in ordinary justice will start with the preliminary hearing on March 27. For this reason, according to ‘Libero’, The Portuguese will travel to Turin before this date, with two objectives: to recover his almost 20 million and to confirm that he never signed secret documents. Prosecutors Gianoglio, Santoriello and Bendoni, in fact, only found the signature of the bianconero club, never that of the ex-madridista. It is a fundamental detail, because this agreement is the center of the second sports trial that could start in the coming days against Juventus, its players and its former players. In 2020 Juve, faced with the crisis caused by the covid, made public the resignation of four months of salary of its players who, in reality, only gave up one month and saw the other three postponed the following year. And in 2021 there was a similar agreement. Federcalcio prosecutors opened a file that could cost the club and its players dearly. As ‘La Repubblica’ points out, agreements with which a club commits to pay salaries that the footballers had only formally waived cannot be deposited with the Federation, and the possible punishments are very harsh for all parties.

The Juve could suffer another sanction in the classification (for ‘Corriere dello Sport’, 15 points that would be added to the 15 that have already been taken away) and, in addition, a fine up to triple the total amount deferred (50 million euros only in 2021). The code of sports justice, in addition, provides for punishments of “at least one month of sanction” also for the players “who agree with the club on remuneration, prizes or compensation that violate federal regulations”. For ‘La Repubblica’, Ronaldo, by not having signed the ‘secret letter’, would avoid this risk, and Bentancur, Kulusevski, Demiral, Chiesa, Danilo and Alex Sandro would be in the same situation. They signed, among others, Rabiot, Szczesny, Bonucci, Cuadrado, Arthur, McKennie, Bernardeschi and Paulo Dybala. The Argentine, whose contract ended in June 2022, spoke to prosecutors in March of last year, revealing all the details of the agreement and acknowledging that “many people believed that we were going to give up four months of salary, nobody knew that we would have received three months, but later. The Argentine explained that the players did not want to “give up so many months” and that the final agreement was “to give up one month, as solidarity, and collect three more without any doubt.” The world champion consulted with his environment, who advised him to sign for maintaining “a good relationship with the club and having better prospects for renewal.” In the end, Juventus let him go as a free agent…