Ligue 1: A year later, Emiliano Sala in the memory and his transfer in court | Flirt 1 2019

A year after the plane in which the Argentine soccer player Emiliano Sala sank into the English Channel, the memory of the Argentine player remains alive in the clubs FC Nantes and Cardiff City, who will pay tribute to him on the first anniversary of his death while, on the other hand, settle in the Court of Sports Arbitration (TAS) their differences for the transfer money of the forward.

The FC Nantes unveil this Tuesday, coinciding with the date of his death, an albiceleste shirt dedicated to what was his top scorer for three seasons.

The French team wear that equipment in their league match next Sunday against the Girondins de Bordeaux, precisely the club with which Sala made the jump to Europe. The money raised with the sale of that shirt will go to the Argentine clubs in which the player was formed.

“Emiliano He was a talented soccer player, warm and human. We all miss him, “says the page of FC Nantes, who announces that during the warm-up of the teams there will be a canvas on the central circle of the field with the portrait of Sala. The video markers will show photographs and videos of their four seasons in the club.

The spectators will receive a magazine with different testimonies of ex-partners and ex-trainers and in the stands a giant typhoon will be displayed as a tribute to the player.

Emiliano Sala, who stood out at Nantes FC between 2015 and 2018, signed a contract with Cardiff City in January 2019, after handling varied and succulent offers. The transfer cost to his new club 17 million euros, a figure hitherto unknown in the gals team.

On January 21, Sala, 28, traveled from Cardiff to Nantes to say goodbye to those who had been his companions and that same night he undertook the trip back to the islands in a private plane, a Piper PA-46 Malib piloted by David Ibbotson.

The ship's trail was lost in the English Channel. The alarm was immediate, although the French and British rescue operations initially opened a door to hope by pointing to the possibility that the plane had landed or landed in an unknown location.

He gives January 30, the first remains of the plane were found on a Norman beach. On February 3 the ship was located at the bottom of the sea. And the gives 7 a body that turned out to be Emiliano Sala's. The pilot, 59, never appeared.

Not a week of mourning had passed when he Nantes and Cardiff began to show their differences on the transfer of the deceased player. The gals club said to pay the signing if it was “contractually bound.” But if there were “any anomalies”, he would defend his “interests,” says President Mehmet Dalman.

The Nantes claims the first agreed payment and asked for the support of FIFA, which on February 27 opened an investigation. According to Cardiff City, the contract he had signed with the Argentine was not legally binding because the Premier League had not validated it.

On April 26 the tragedy added a new chapter with the death by heart attack of Sala's father, Horacio, in Progreso (Argentina).

On September 30, FIFA ruled that Cardiff must pay Nantes the 6 million euros corresponding to the first term of the transfer of the forward. In his decision he took into account the “unique and specific circumstances of this tragic situation”. The gals club was not satisfied and appealed to the TAS.

The definitive solution of the case will take several months, since the Arbitration Court, when announcing that it accepted the case, also specified that there will be no sentence before the month of June. At some time before that period, hold a hearing with the parties involved.

The Cardiff aspires with his recourse not to pay any amount for a player that he can no longer enjoy. But the corts do not take away the brave: the club has encouraged its members and followers to meet this Tuesday and remind Sala about the statue of Fred Keenor, in the immediate vicinity of his stadium, to remind him on the first anniversary of his death.

In the St David's Cathedral there will be a religious service in memory of Sala and Ibbotson, to which members of the club will attend.

Meanwhile, coinciding with the anniversary, the book “The Murder of Emiliano Sala” has been published in the United Kingdom, written by journalist Harry Harris, which extends a shadow of suspicion about the role of Nantes in the fatal accident. According to the author, the courts will soon decide whether there is a basis to support these doubts.

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