Napoli President Aurelio De Laurentiis being Investigated for false accounting

Napoli could be caught up in a scandal

Napoli President Aurelio De Laurentiis is in hot water now that he’s being investigated for false accounting regarding the transfer of Greek defender Kostas Manolas back in 2019, when he made a €36 million move from AS Roma to Napoli.

The investigation is being conducted by the Rome Prosecutor’s Office and is a part of a larger investigation into suspected fictitious capital gains which were used to inflate the club’s balance sheets through irregular financial operations.

Here are some details of the Manola’s transfer via Foot Italia:

The Manolas transfer was a significant move in the 2019 summer transfer window, with the then 28-year-old Greek international being Napoli’s second most expensive acquisition that year, following the €45 million purchase of Hirving Lozano from PSV Eindhoven.

At the time of the transfer, Roma announced that they had sold Manolas to Napoli for a fixed fee of €36 million. This deal allowed Roma to record a substantial capital gain of approximately €31.1 million in their financial statements for the year ending June 30, 2019. It is this financial aspect of the deal that has now come under scrutiny.

This isn’t the first time that De Laurentiis has been investigated for something like this since this is actually connected to a previous investigation involving the transfer of star striker Victor Osimhen to Napoli in 2020. Of course Osimhen is currently out on loan at Turkish side Galatasaray.

De Laurentiis is being represented by lawyers, Lorenzo Contrada and Fabio Fulgeri and they’ve made it clear that their client is ready to state why he’s innocent of any accusation of wrongdoing.

Feel free to comment below and give us your thoughts on these accusations against De Laurentiis.