Arsenal de Sarandí: A Case of Football Privatization

Two private companies, Malte SRL and Recomi SA, managed by a leader with close ties to the leadership of the Argentine Football Association (AFA), have managed the professional football of Arsenal de Sarandí, the historic institution linked to the Grondona family, since 2019. Both companies shared a key name: Juan Pablo Beacon, a former member of the AFA's Federal Council and a trusted leader of Pablo Toviggino, the entity's treasurer. Although publicly, AFA president Claudio 'Chiqui' Tapia advocates against the privatization of clubs, documentation reviewed in various investigations reveals that internal allies advanced with management schemes that concentrated economic rights and generated million-dollar businesses. Beacon managed Malte SRL between 2021 and 2022 and remained linked to Recomi SA at least until December 2025. These firms were linked to Fabián Marcelo Saracco, Beacon's business partner and also related to AFA and Argentina national team contracts. Beacon also personally represented Arsenal before FIFA and the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) to claim funds from the 'solidarity mechanism' for transfers of players trained at the club. Between 2020 and 2022, the club leased its stadium to the entity led by Tapia for official events, with billings exceeding 130 million pesos, mostly during the last year of the relationship. While the club was still in the first division, a second management scheme appeared. Both companies not only did business with clubs but also with the AFA itself: Malte billed millions of pesos for the provision of coronavirus tests for the Professional League, while Recomi issued invoices for advisory services directly to the football's governing body. The scope of these societies extended beyond Arsenal. With the classification to the Copa Sudamericana in 2021, agreements were made with societies based in Spain, the United States, and Paraguay to channel external income, including Conmebol prizes and footballer transfers. In all cases, the management companies were responsible for the comprehensive management of professional football and received income from television broadcasting, player transfers, sponsorship, and stadium rentals, among other items. The Arsenal case is paradigmatic. Months later, Malte even tried to grant the club a loan at a rate much lower than the inflation of the time, a move that experts described as harmful to the institution. During that period, Arsenal became an international business platform. The agreement, signed by Julio Grondona (son), established the total assignment of the club's economic rights in exchange for the company covering the team's salaries and obligations. Buenos Aires, January 19, 2026 - Total News Agency - TNA - The controversy over the entry of sports anonymous societies in Argentine football had a little-known precedent that today regains relevance in the framework of the so-called AFAgate. On April 27, 2019, the same day the club achieved promotion to the first division, it signed a 28-month management contract with Malte SRL. After Arsenal's relegation in 2024, the relationship was broken and led to a judicial dispute that concluded with an economic agreement in favor of the company. After the successive managements, Arsenal fell into a deep sporting crisis: it was relegated from the first division, then from the Primera Nacional, and today it plays in the Primera B Metropolitana. They also intervened in clubs of the ascent such as Sol de Mayo of Río Negro and Estudiantes de Río Cuarto. Recomi SA signed a contract in 2021 that included a 'recognition' consisting of the assignment of players' federative rights. According to commercial and judicial records, Toviggino was aware of the day-to-day functioning of these firms. A chapter that deepens the suspicions about the use of institutional power for private benefit. Sources consulted: La Nación; judicial and commercial documentation; corporate records; sources linked to the AFA and Argentine football. Among the managed cases are the transfers of Alejandro 'Papu' Gómez, Darío Benedetto, Iván Marcone, and Lisandro López, with payments that ended up in the hands of the management company. The links between Arsenal and the AFA also generated cross-income. Two of them, Joaquín Pombo and Leonel Picco, were later transferred for millionaire figures. In parallel, Justice is investigating if Malte SRL was used as a screen for AFA authorities, after being the owner of the Pilar mansion linked to the case, where personal elements of Toviggino were found during a raid. The exposed scheme reveals that, while the AFA's official discourse rejects sports anonymous societies, in practice there were mechanisms of covert privatization, with companies linked to the leadership that managed clubs, concentrated resources, and crossed businesses with the football's governing entity itself.