Neuchâtel Xamax lose Swiss league expulsion appeal

By Andrew Warshaw

January 27 – Two-time Swiss champions Neuchâtel Xamax, the club where FIFA President Sepp Blatter used to be a director, have lost their appeal against being thrown out of the Swiss league for financial irregularities.

The decision by the Swiss Football League came 48 hours after the club’s controversial owner, Chechen businessman Bulat Chagaev, put his entire squad on gardening leave after calling them back from a training camp in Dubai.

Last week the club was stripped of their playing licence less than a year after being taken over by Chagaev who took control from Swiss entrepreneur Sylvio Bernasconi.

The ruling was taken after Chagaev was suspected of using a falsified bank document as a financial guarantee.  

Xamax already faced an eight-point penalty that was imposed after failing to pay its players’ wages in September and October last year.

Few expected the appeal – made in the Swiss canton of Bern at the regional court of Bern-Mittelland – to be successful and Xamax now seem certain to be excluded when the Swiss league resumes after the winter break in the first week of February.

Chagaev, who puts the club’s misfortunes down to an orchestrated media campaign to oust him, has dismissed five coaches and the entire administrative staff, as well as dropping all the club’s sponsors.

Last summer he even brought in a new crest featuring Chechen symbols and submitted an application to the SFL to change the club’s name, though it was rejected.

Swiss reports said he was now being held in custody in Geneva.

FIFA veteran Walter Gagg, a lifelong fan who played for Xamax at the time Blatter was a director, is spearheading a consortium to revive the club in the lower leagues next season.

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