Madrid coaches and players convicted of tax fraud: Ancelotti, Cristiano, the Xabi Alonso case...

Carlo Ancelotti has been sentenced to one year in prison for tax fraud against the Spanish Treasury, for which he will also have to pay a fine of 386,361.93 euros . He's not the first Real Madrid coach to have problems with the Tax Agency, and a number ofReal Madrid players have also received financial sanctions and criminal penalties.

Luis Figo was one of the first convicted. The National Court ordered him to pay nearly two and a half million euros in personal income tax for the years 1997, 1998, and 1999, while still a player for FC Barcelona. Míchel Salgado received 330,000 euros for the image rights transferred to his company.

Davor Suker had to pay €258,962 for his image rights, a major financial headache for Real Madrid players. Another legend of the era, Predrag Mijatovic , was forced to pay €285,000, in his case for irregular transactions shortly after leaving his position as Real Madrid's sporting director.

The worst period for Real Madrid in terms of its relationship with the tax authorities was under José Mourinho , who was not spared: the Portuguese player had to pay around €500,000 in tax returns for 2011 and 2012. Several of his players also had to accept fines and make deals. Fábio Coentrao was fined €1.7 million for pretending to transfer his image rights to companies in tax havens. A similar case was experienced by Ángel Di María , who defrauded €1.3 million.

Mesut Ozil was fined €2.8 million for once again being implicated in a business scheme to evade payments for his image rights. The same applies to Ricardo Carvalho , who received a one-year prison sentence and a €800,000 fine; Iker Casillas , who received €2 million for "differences over how tax treatment is applied to certain income"; Luka Modric , who accepted an eight-month prison sentence and a €1.4 million fine; and Marcelo , who received a €735,000 fine.

Cristiano Ronaldo was sentenced by the Spanish courts to pay almost 19 million euros and two years in prison, although he never entered a penitentiary, as part of a deal in which he had to plead guilty to four tax offenses committed between 2011 and 2014, which amounted to tax fraud of 14,768,897 euros . The final criminal settlement reduced the amount defrauded to 5.7 million euros, although the fine remained unchanged.

The only player to win his legal battle against the Treasury was Xabi Alonso . Last May, the National Court ruled in favor of the Tolosa native in his dispute with the Tax Agency, which claimed €288,507.58 for failing to pay personal income tax on payments his agent received in 2012 from Real Madrid.