MADRID: Atletico Madrid reported Barcelona to football’s governing body FIFA over illegal contact made to star forward Antoine Griezmann, Atletico club sources confirmed on Tuesday.
“The complaint has been presented for repeated contact between Barcelona, the player and his team,” an Atletico source told AFP.
Griezmann renewed his contract until 2022 in June and Atletico consider contact made by Barcelona not only breaks FIFA’s rules, but could also affect the integrity of La Liga.
Barcelona lead the league with Atletico their closest challengers six points behind in second.
“He is a player under a long contract and this can’t happen. Moreover, the club considers that it could affect the competition where Barca are currently top and Atletico second,” added the Atletico source.
Barca were slapped with a one-year transfer ban for the illegal recruitment of foreign minors by FIFA that was served in 2015.
Should the Catalan giants be found guilty, they could be handed another ban on registering new players.
“We can confirm that we have received a complaint from Atletico de Madrid concerning the said matter,” a FIFA spokesperson told AFP.
Barcelona-based sports daily Mundo Deportivo reported on Sunday that Barca’s president Josep Maria Bartomeu had recently met with Griezmann’s family.
The Catalan giants are expected to be willing to pay the French international’s 100 million euro ($117.8 million) buyout clause at the end of the season to avoid negotiating with Atletico.
Barca’s director of institutional relations Guillermo Amor turned down the opportunity to deny a meeting had taken place later on Sunday after Barca’s 4-0 thrashing of Deportivo la Coruna.
“If the paper says it then it is possible it is like that,” Amor told Movistar TV. “There could have been a coming together.”
Griezmann, 26, agreed to sign a new contract with Atletico in June after the club had an appeal against a transfer ban rejected.
Top scorer at Euro 2016, Griezmann said it would have been “dirty” to walk out on the club when they couldn’t replace him until January.
However, Atletico coach Diego Simeone accepted last week that Griezmann’s departure at some point in the future is inevitable.
“Of course Griezmann will be able to leave at some point, as Diego Costa, Diego Ribas and Arda Turan have gone,” Simeone told French sports daily L’Equipe.
“If a player comes to me and says, ‘coach, I have a chance of a lifetime and want to leave’, and if he’s left everything on the pitch for me like Griezmann, I’ll say, ‘no problem’.”
Griezmann has scored 90 goals in 179 games for Atletico since joining from Real Sociedad in 2014 and led Los Rojiblancos to the 2016 Champions League final, scoring twice to eliminated Barca in the quarter-finals.
However, he was also caught up in a Twitter storm on Sunday after posting a picture of himself blacked up and mimicking a Harlem Globetrotter basketball player from the 1980s.
“I recognize that it was clumsy of me. If I have offended people, I apologize,” he wrote shortly after and deleted the photo after receiving a wave of criticism.
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Atletico Madrid report Barcelona for illegal Griezmann approach
Atletico Madrid report Barcelona for illegal Griezmann approach
Canada’s Lee sets pace, Kim in the hunt for LIV Golf wild card spots
- LIV Golf Promotions in Florida offers top 3 finishers a chance to play in 2026 regular season
LECANTO: Canada’s Richard T. Lee has proved the player to watch during the first three days at LIV Golf Promotions and is now well-placed for a wild-card spot in the 2026 LIV Golf season.
Anthony Kim, meanwhile, found another gear on the back nine on Saturday, putting him in a better position to return to full-time status in the league.
The final 18 holes of the 36-hole shootout at Black Diamond Ranch take place on Sunday with a potentially career-changing reward for the top three finishers — guaranteed LIV Golf wild-card status for 2026. In addition, the top 10 and ties earn exemptions into the Asian Tour’s International Series.
For the second time this week, Lee led the field with a bogey-free 6-under 64. The 35-year-old will take a two-shot lead over his closest pursuers going into Sunday, giving him a significant advantage. However, he does not plan to take his foot off the gas.
“Honestly, I don’t think it would be comfortable for any player to have a two-shot lead on the last day,” said Lee, who has two eagles, 13 birdies and just one bogey in his 54 competitive holes this week. “I’ll just put my hat on and just play my golf.”
Kim is among three players who are tied for second after shooting a bogey-free 4-under 66, along with South Africa’s Oliver Bekker and Thailand’s Jazz Janewattananond. Denmark’s Lucas Bjerregaard is solo fifth after his 3-under 67, with five other players lurking at 1 under.
Kim, who played as a wild card in the past two seasons following his return to competitive golf after a 12-year retirement, was just 1 under through 12 holes on Saturday. But he made consecutive lengthy birdie putts at the 13th and 14th holes, birdied the par-5 16th, then saved par with a 15-footer at the par-4 18th that circled the cup before dropping.
“I have an opportunity to get one of those spots,” said the 40-year-old, the only American to advance to the weekend. “That’s what I asked for coming into this week and put myself in a good position. Now I’ve just got to go finish.”
Kim would not be in this position had he not made an 8-foot birdie putt on the 18th on Friday to make the cut on the number.
“I knew that if I didn’t make birdie on 18 [Friday] that my chances of playing on LIV next year were gone, and to me that’s a big deal,” Kim said. “I’d like to play at the highest level against the best players. It meant a lot to me.”
Bekker was part of LIV Golf’s inaugural field at the 2022 London tournament. Four seasons later, he’s excited about the opportunity to return to the league as a full-time member.
“Thinking back on it now, I had the opportunity to play a few more events, and now I’m like, well, maybe I should have played them,” he said. “The water was a bit rough at that stage and didn’t know what was going to happen, so I played it a bit safe. Luckily, I’ve been given another opportunity this week, and hopefully I can take it.”
Janewattananond won four tournaments in 2019 when he became a top 50 world player and, aged 30, still has years left in his competitive career. After shooting a second-round 67 to advance to the weekend, he shot a 66 on Saturday that included four birdies in a six-hole stretch to end his front nine.
“It’s a very big prize at the end of the day,” he said. “Those three spots up for grabs, it would give me freedom to play wherever I want and security for my family.”
The 34-year-old Bjerregaard, a two-time winner on the DP World Tour, said earning full-time LIV Golf status would be career-changing.
“Where I am in my career right now, it’s probably that or retirement,” he said. “Yeah, that would mean a lot for sure.”
Although nothing is guaranteed, Lee has played so well this week that there may be just two spots available for the remainder of the field.
“We’re not playing for one spot,” said Janewattananond. “I don’t have to worry about him. I just have to worry about myself.”
“He played great today,” added Bjerregaard, playing in the same group as Lee on Saturday. “But I would be happy with any of the other two spots, so that’s fine. I can finish third. I wouldn’t mind.”
