Now at Sassuolo after being sold there by West Ham United last summer, Pedro Obiang is back in Italy, where he has spent the vast majority of his career.
Prior to his move to London Stadium, the Equatorial Guinea international had spent seven years at Sampdoria between 2008 and 2015 after moving there from Atlético Madrid’s B team.
The midfielder was then bought by West Ham for around €6.5m, where he was under contract for four seasons during which he made 116 appearances, scored three goals and picked up three assists.
However, that €6.5m transaction remains in the news to this day, as Il Fatto Quotidiano explain a chunk of it was being investigated after Sampdoria’s owner, Massimo Ferrero, was accused of ‘fraudulent declaration, self laundering and scam’ for stealing €1,159,000 from the coffers of Sampdoria from the Obiang transfer fee.
The prosecutors claimed ‘that money would have been used by Ferrero, alongside his daughter Vanessia, nephew Giorgio and two other men, to cover the losses of his companies that were ‘in dangerous debt exposures’’.
Despite this, the GUP were not convinced by the arguments, finding ‘the investigation of the Public Prosecutor of Rome incomplete, contradictory and insufficient’ to bring Ferrero to trial, thus acquitting the Sampdoria owner.
West Ham had nothing to do with any of this, but it was their money that was supposedly used.
All in all, a win for Ferrero.
