Juventus kicked out of European Conference League

Juventus’ accounting problems don’t seem to be going away any time soon.

Today, Juventus was kicked out of the UEFA Conference League as a penalty for false accounting. This is on top of being docked 10 points over the season which saw them drop out of the top 4 of Serie A. According to ESPN.com, their Conference League spot will go to Fiorentina.

This is just more fallout from the accounting scandals that have plagued the team for the better part of the last 6 months. Juventus originally was handed down a 15-point reduction. They then got those points back after an Italian judge suspended the penalty. Yet, after new information and reexamining the evidence, Juventus still was hit with a 10-point penalty.

This is a potentially big blow to Juve’s summer transfer options. Many top players want to be able to play in some sort of European competition.

At this point, Juventus will not see European games until next season. That is only if there aren’t more penalties to come, which, as of now, doesn’t seem to be the case.

Bans like this also hurt the team’s bottom line. Juve has not had an easy go of it financially since they signed Cristiano Ronaldo years ago and this is only going to set the team back further.

Juventus’ recent ban should be a signal to the new front office group that accounting cover-ups will always be caught. Juve needs to do a better job of keeping their books clean if they want to get this club back to dominating Serie A.