🤨 French club could shut down after bust-up with striker, here’s why | OneFootball

Ajaccio, a club with 115 years in French football and the main representative of Corsica, faces the risk of ending its activities due to a legal dispute with a striker.

In a letter sent to the president of FIFA, Gianni Infantino, the board asks for help to reverse what it classifies as a fraudulent process involving striker Youcef Belaili.

The player, who wore the team's jersey in the 2022/23 season, demands 380,000 euros (about R$ 2.3 million) from Ajaccio. The board, however, maintains that Belaili had previously been ordered to pay this amount to Al-Ahli, a club from Saudi Arabia.

"Our club is the victim of a fraud backed by a FIFA decision in July 2025. This deliberation, based on a false document, prevents us from registering reinforcements and has put us in a state of clinical death," Ajaccio claimed in an official statement.

According to the note, the conviction used a memorandum of understanding supposedly signed by former director Alain Caldarella and Al-Ahli, but both deny the existence of the document.

Administratively relegated to the seventh division due to financial difficulties, Ajaccio now only competes in a regional league of Corsica. The city, in the Mediterranean, is known for being the birthplace of Napoleon Bonaparte.

In the letter, the centennial club reinforces the appeal: "Mr. President, this is not just a sporting issue. It is the survival of a centennial club, which is trying to rise again with a solid and sustainable project. We cannot accept that our institution be sacrificed by forgeries. The alternatives presented are to pay the 380,000 euros, the result of a fraud, or to disappear. Is this what represents the justice of world football?"

Founded in 1910, Ajaccio has won the French second division on two occasions and competed in 14 seasons at the elite level. Its best performance in Ligue 1 was in 1970/71, when it finished in sixth place.

This article was translated into English by Artificial Intelligence. You can read the original version in 🇧🇷 here.

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