Targeted by a legal investigation into the scandal of inflated capital gains, which cost it a 10-point penalty last season in Serie A, Juventus Turin today sees its name mixed with that of OM. As revealed by an investigation of France Football this Sunday, an operation between the two clubs is today the subject of a 19-page file in Italy: that of the cross transfer of Marley Aké (ex-OM) and Franco Tongya (ex-Juve) in 2021.
According to the investigators, this “mirror operation” – according to the name given by FF – would relate to the numerous sleight of hand used by Juventus in recent seasons to stay on top financially. In total, there are 22 contentious movements, often with overvaluations in the prices of players, which would have been carried out by the Turin club. If the Old Lady club and OM had, at the time, each communicated on two separate transfers amounting to €8 million, it will probably take more to convince the Italian justice system to overlook this.
The proximity between Pablo Longoria and Juventus raises questions
Furthermore, another element did not escape the investigators in charge of the case: the proximity between the president of OM, Pablo Longoria, and Juventus Turin, a club for which he had served as director of recruitment between 2015 and 2018, and where he was also very close to a certain Fabio Paratici, former sporting director of the club suspended for 30 months by FIFA in the context of this same affair. However, neither the Marseille prosecutor’s office nor the national financial prosecutor’s office have, to date, received any denunciations from their Italian counterparts, specifies FF. Clearly, OM should not be worried.
Contacted by France Football, the Marseille club also reacted to the subject of this ambiguous operation: “This transfer took place and is well recorded in our accounts, without fictitious added value or exchange of money”, it was indicated . An investigation which has therefore been ongoing for more than a year and which has been exported to France. Moreover, OM is not the only club cited in this affair since an operation between Juve and Amiens, to a lesser degree (the arrival of Rafael Bandeira and the departure of Félix Nzouango to Juve in 2020 ), still raises several questions today.
