Espanyol has not yet said its last word on what, at least so far, is its sixth relegation in its history. The blue and white entity considers that it has been seriously harmed by several arbitration decisions throughout this campaign that would have ended up crystallizing in a loss of category that is a hard blow to its heritage.

That is why he wants the ordinary courts to rule on this point and is preparing to go to them next week. "From the club we consider that there are several refereeing and VAR decisions that we do not understand and that have had a direct impact on our relegation. We believe that we had earned the right to play the permanence at home, on the last day, and they have not allowed us to do so, "says Joan Capdevila, former footballer and member of the institutional area of the entity.

Club sources reiterate that it is not about seeking to correct possible refereeing errors, but that they are, in any case, various extraordinary situations that would have been detrimental to the interests of Espanyol. The rearbitration, so to speak, of the action that cost Vinicius the red card against Valencia and that was later withdrawn by Competition, from his point of view, opens the door to this option.

For now, it has already proceeded to the audiovisual compilation of all the actions in which it considers to have been seriously harmed, with the aim of supporting its arguments in a documentary way. An information in which, in addition to the possible phantom goal of Atlético de Madrid, there are several actions of expulsions of blue and white players, goals finally not conceded by previous fouls and, even, the action of the jump of César Montes with Mamardashvili sanctioned as a foul in a play that could have meant the 1-3 against Valencia last weekend, a foul on Braithwaite before the final 2-2 or a possible penalty on the Dane, near the end of the duel, which could have drastically changed the result of it.

At the moment, the Competition Committee has already decided to dismiss the first claim of the club in the sports instances for Griezmann's goal that meant the momentary 0-2 in his duel with Atlético last week and that went up to the scoreboard after going through the VAR. Espanyol argued that the concession of that goal was "a manifest negligence" that ended up causing "an adulteration of the party".

Competition, however, considers that it does not have the necessary competence to judge this action, since, according to its arguments, the facts denounced do not respond to any infringement of the rules of the game. The club, for now, has already decided to take this case also to Appeal and, if necessary, will also reach the Court of Arbitration for Sport. A sporting path that will be accompanied, in parallel, with the decision to also go to the ordinary courts.

Precedents

The precedents of other sports entities in similar cases seem to lean in favor of the club's arguments. The Obradoiro, for example, got the ordinary justice to agree and force the ACB to make a hole in the top category of Spanish basketball in the 2007-08 season with the conditions of the 1990-91 season after its entry was paralyzed again in the 2003-04 campaign. Although, in that case, the admission occurred after several courts gave the reason and that the case reached the Superior Court of Justice of Madrid, the one in charge ultimately of settling the conditions of access in the absence of agreement between the two parties. The ACB wanted the conditions in force at the time of admission to apply, while the club claimed that they were those of the moment in which the irregularity that prevented it from doing so directly through sports occurred.

In 1995, on the other hand, the then Professional Football League had to expand the competition to 22 teams after an administrative relegation of Sevilla and Celta, for not having presented the corresponding guarantees in time, which did not finally become fully effective before the massive protests of its followers.

  • RCD Espanyol
  • football

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