While the magistrate who cleared all clubs in the capital gains case argues Juventus could show ‘good faith,’ the wiretapped conversations – especially those criticising Fabio Paratici – could change that. ‘Beppe Marotta could put the brakes on him, then he had carte blanche.’
There was already an attempt to bring sporting and legal sanctions against several clubs, including Juve, a few weeks ago for artificially inflating transfer fees to help balance the books, particularly with regards to player exchanges.
That was dismissed right from the start and the magistrate who made that call – Ludovico Morello of the Tribunal in Turin – believes the same could happen this time too.
“If Juventus really did stick to the standard procedures, it would be difficult to prove guilt” of financial mismanagement, because there could still be ‘good faith’ in the approach, he told news agency ANSA.
This is the defence that worked for them all last time, essentially that the only true value of a player is what two clubs agree on the transfer fee, and there is no other way of objectively deciding their worth.
However, the latest wiretapped telephone conversations in the Juventus case could trip them up, because there are some quotes seeming to acknowledge the inflated nature of these fees.
The most important conversation was had by current director Federico Cherubini, who was criticising former director Paratici, who was his superior and is now at Tottenham Hotspur.
“You just couldn’t reason with Fabio,” said Cherubini.
“As long as Marotta was there, he could put the brakes on him. When Marotta went, he had carte blanche. Fabio could wake up in the morning and sign away €20m without anyone telling him anything.
“I told him several times: we’re over-doing it here. I mean, it’s a legit system, but you’re pushing it too far. He replied: it doesn’t matter to us. If you put 4 or 10, nobody can say anything.”
Giuseppe Marotta had worked with Paratici at Sampdoria first and then they moved together to Juventus in 2010.
There was a surprise when Marotta was pushed out of Juve in October 2018, reportedly at the time due to Paratici wanting more control and disagreements with President Andrea Agnelli.
Marotta went on to become director of Inter in December 2018, leading them to the Scudetto that ended the Juventus hegemony after nine years.
Marotta was never the CEO of Inter, please check and correct.
Alessandro Antonello is the CEO.
Pushing Marotta out and choosing Paratici was so idiotic by Agnelli. That really showed his worth as a president and now he rightfully gets kicked out.
Inter has two CEOs, one for Sport and one for Corporate