Fifty thousand pages. That is the reported size of the dossier Real Madrid have handed Uefa about Barcelona's payments to a former vice-president of Spain's refereeing committee, and Real describe its contents as evidence of extraordinary gravity. Uefa called the submission substantial. Its ethics and disciplinary inspectors will read it as part of a review that has been open since 2023.
The money went to Jose Maria Enriquez Negreira between 2001 and 2018 and came to 8.4m euros, roughly 7.2m pounds. Barcelona's explanation has not moved since the story surfaced in 2023: the payments bought scouting and technical reports on officials, prepared by Negreira and his company Dasnil 95. They deny wrongdoing. They have denied it every time anyone has asked.
What Real are actually claiming
Their statement on Thursday said the documents contain evidence "which directly affects the integrity of the competition and confidence in the refereeing system". They asked for the investigation to move "as quickly as possible until its complete conclusion" and for officials to act in line with the seriousness of what has been proven.
That the money was used to bribe referees has been alleged before. Barcelona reject it, in the strongest terms available to them.
Barcelona's answer was procedural, and pointed
Their reply came the same day and reads like it went through a lawyer twice. Uefa had not opened any new proceedings against them, they said. The 2023 proceedings had never been closed, so nothing needed reopening. Two investigators appointed back then have since done whatever they considered appropriate, and Barcelona say they have complied with every request put to them.
Then the line that matters most: as of Thursday, the investigators had made no new requests of Barcelona and had not forwarded Real Madrid's complaint to them. If they do, the club said, it will respond. The file, Barcelona added, is tied to the criminal proceedings running in Spain and stays there until those finish.
Why this has gone nowhere for three years
Because it has already been tested once. In June 2023 Uefa's investigators decided Barcelona would face no punishment, and the club has played in European competition every season since. A court in Barcelona opened its own examination that year and is still working.
La Liga ruled itself out early. Javier Tebas said in March 2023 that the competition could take no action because too much time had passed. His phrase was that the case is time-barred in sports law, but not in criminal law, and that distinction is doing a great deal of work here. So Real have aimed their 50,000 pages at the one body whose file is still open. Size is not the test. The test is whether any of it is new.
Case context: Barcelona paid 8.4m euros (7.2m pounds) to Jose Maria Enriquez Negreira, a former vice-president of Spain's referees' committee, between 2001 and 2018. The club says the payments covered scouting and technical reports and denies wrongdoing. Uefa investigators decided against punishment in June 2023; a Barcelona court investigation opened the same year remains ongoing.
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