Football
Sam Marsden, Barcelona correspondent 8y

Real Madrid, Atletico Madrid transfer bans 'unjust' - Barcelona's Luis Enrique

Luis Enrique feels the transfer bans handed out to La Liga title rivals Real Madrid and Atletico Madrid are unjust.

FIFA confirmed on Thursday that the two Madrid clubs' appeals against their one-year transfer bans for breaking rules protecting underage players had been rejected.

It leaves Real and Atletico in a similar position to the one Barcelona found themselves in two years ago.

"I think I said it was unjust when we were banned, no?" Barca boss Luis Enrique said when asked about the bans at a news conference on Friday. "Well, I think the same now. Luckily, we managed to get over our ban."

Barca were banned from signing players in 2015, although they prepared for their transfer embargo with seven signings in the summer of 2014, including Luis Suarez and Ivan Rakitic.

Real Madrid, in particular, have not indulged in such spending this summer. Both Real and Atletico will appeal their bans to the Court of Arbitration for Sport, although should that fail they will be unable to sign players until 2018.

Luis Enrique, though, feels both clubs have the depth to cope with the bans.

However, after guiding Barca to a treble while they were prohibited from making signings, he hopes neither Madrid club repeats the Blaugrana's success.

"Both Madrid sides have great squads [to deal with the bans]," he added. "But I hope they don't have the same results as us during their bans!"

Barca vice president Carles Vilarrubi echoed Enrique's sentiments, adding the bans given to the Madrid clubs were "unjust and out of proportion," and hit out at the lack of support the Catalan club received during their ban.

"Two years ago we received no support from the other clubs," he said. "On the contrary, they worked against us. They accused us of human-trafficking of children and we had our worst two years and the newspaper covers about us were the worst possible.

"We got no support from anyone. The media in our country should go back and take a look at some of the things they wrote when FIFA sanctioned Barcelona."

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