Police issue new statement on tragic crash that killed Diogo Jota and brother

Spanish police's investigations are continuing

Football was stunned last week by the death of the Liverpool forward and his brother, who was also a professional footballer playing for Portuguese second-tier club Penafiel.

Now, a new statement from police reveals that tests have taken place to confirm who was driving the car at the time of the crash - and whether the crash was caused by excess speed.

The Civil Guard said: “The expert report is still being worked on and finalised.

“Among other things traffic police from the Zamora branch of the Civil Guard are studying the tread marked by one of the wheels of the vehicle. Everything is also pointing to a possible high excess of speed over the permitted speed on that stretch of the motorway.

“All the tests carried out for the moment point to the driver of the crash vehicle being Diogo Jota. The expert police report when it is finalised will be handed over to a court in Puebla de Sanabria.”

Spanish police had initially said on the day of the incident: “The information we have so far is that the car, which was a Lamborghini, was in a road traffic accident and left the road due to a tyre blowout while overtaking.

“It was in the early hours, 00:30 BST, in the municipality of Cernadilla in the province of Zamora.

“The car caught on fire and the two occupants were killed.”

It’s been revealed by his physiotherapist that Jota was heading for an England-bound ferry when he tragically died.

Just10 days previously, he had married the mother of his three children Rute Cardoso.

In an interview with Portuguese publication Record, the beloved Wolverhampton Wanderers and Liverpool star’s respiratory physio Miguel Goncalves shared that Jota had been playing through a condition known as pneumothorax towards the end of last season, requiring surgery in the summer, and so he needed to avoid flying for a while.