Thread by @SwedishRumble

#BarcaGate / the Negreira case will probably end up as the biggest scandal football ever seen when everything is said and done. How and when it starts to have affect on the present is not clear, but the first step could be a ban of Barca from the CL.(1/10) elmundo.es/deportes/futbo…

What is undisputed is that Barca over more than 15 years have paid almost €7,000,000 under the table to the VP of reffing body of La Liga. When the payments stopped, the official in question — Negreira — blackmailed Barca to keep paying him, or he threatened to come clean.(2/10)

Surprising? Well on one hand Negreira have a long history of being involved in scandals, accused of embezzling funds from organization and being involved in rigged matches. On the other hand, it’s proven that presidents of Barca have embezzled funds from the club to bribe (3/10)

journalists and social media profiles to impact the election of presidents of the club, and been involved in many many other scandals such as illegal organ trades (!), tax fraud and what not. So no, regardless of how outrageous it sounds, it should not be surprising. (4/10)

Even despite being accused of multiple crimes (!), Barca’s president Laport is regularly seen sitting next to the chief of the Catalan police at Barca’s home games. And perhaps coincidently, perhaps not, Spanish law time bars the most serious breaches of the sport laws (5/10)

after just 36 months. So on the home field — it’s hard to speculate on what will happen, while the outrage from rival clubs of course is unprecedented. But UEFA does not time bar corruption and bribes of refs, meaning that the organization has every opportunity to lay down (6/10)

…the law on Barca. Will it happen? This scandal is too big to sweep under the carpet. But — it is important to not forget the enormous importance of what is at stake here. On one hand, you surely genuinely risk the integrity of the game of football. On the other, FCB is a(7/10)

…club in a very pressured situation financially that totally is in the hands of its creditors. The only “reasonable” action to take is to do what Italy did with Juventus, strip them of titles and toss them out of the top league. FCB could point fingers at those who really (8/10)

…deserve the blame, it’s presidents and other officials. But could Barca survive that financially? To evaluate that, a thorough review of its financial state and financing agreements must be conducted — which of course is impossible for someone on the outside to do. (9/10)

But from afar, it seems very hard. And if Barca goes down for real, that is a tremendous blow to Spanish — and — European football. So not only is the scandal itself so sinister and rotten that it’s almost impossible to understand — the effects of it could be just as monumental.