11.03.2018 11:01 h

Benfica boss defends club's honour over corruption 'attack'

Benfica president Luis Filipe Vieira, whose club is being investigated for corruption, insisted that his team had nothing to be ashamed of and asked justice to act quickly.

"I want to say to all the supporters of Benfica that my management and I have never sullied the honour and dignity of Benfica," Vieira told reporters after Benfica beat Aves, 2-0, on Saturday evening.

He appealed on the authorities "to act quickly".

Benfica, the most popular Portuguese club, is the subject of several investigations.

On Wednesday, prosecutors charged Paulo Goncalves, the head of Benfica's legal department, with "crimes of active and passive corruption, breach of court confidentiality, computer fraud and patronage."

Four other people, most of them current or former employees of the Ministry of Justice, were also charged.

Investigators suspect that Benfica gained illegal access to information on ongoing investigations involving them or rivals Sporting and FC Porto.

In October, Goncalves was indicted in another investigation, dubbed the "e-mail business", into a system for bribing referees to help Benfica.

In January, Vieira and his number two Fernando Tavares were implicated in a case involving trying to exert influence on a Lisbon Court of Appeals judge.

"We have been victims of an unprecedented attack in Portugal," said Vieira, adding that Benfica was "the most envied club in Portugal".

He said that, from Monday, "a crisis legal team would be created" charged with suing all those who had blackened the name of Benfica.