The Court of Arbitration for Sport has delivered its ruling on Atlético Madrid’s appeal of their transfer ban and the news is not good for the capital city club.
Following the discovery of irregularities over the signing of minors, FIFA hit Los Rojiblancos with a ban on registering players of two transfer windows and that has been confirmed by the Switzerland-based court, with the panel of Efraim Barak, Ulrich Haas and Romano F. Subiotto dismissing the arguments put forth by the club and by the Martens Lawyers legal team.
Although one of those windows was already served last winter, Atlético will not be able to register any new players this summer and will have to wait until January 2018 to do so.
That leaves sporting director Andrea Berta with the challenge of putting a competitive squad together for the 2017/18 season without being able to bring in any new faces – such as Diego Costa, Fabinho, Vitolo, Sandro and Alexandre Lacazette, all of whom had been linked with the club.
Instead he will have to look to the recalling of on-loan players such as Matías Kranevitter, Luciano Vietto and Diogo Jota, while the decision will also surely impact on potential exits per Euan Mctear.
As of today, we will work to close the ongoing operations as soon as possible and register players on January 1st https://t.co/vhWpztBZVY
— Atlético de Madrid (@atletienglish) June 1, 2017
The club followed up issuing a statement with a tone of defying execration over the CAS verdict labeling it as “unjust” and causing “irreparable damage.”
“This ruling is unjust, poses an unfair disadvantage in comparable cases and causes an irreparable damage to our club.”
This ruling is unjust, poses an unfair disadvantage in comparable cases and causes an irreparable damage to our club https://t.co/vhWpztBZVY
— Atlético de Madrid (@atletienglish) June 1, 2017
They however, stand defiant and feel confident ahead of the new season,
“We have full confidence in our current squad, with which we have won direct passage to the Champions League for the fifth year in a row and have reached the semi-finals of the Champions League and the King’s Cup.
“The club has the commitment of the players and coaching staff to continue competing at the same level next season, despite this decision that is evidently detrimental to us.”
