Ballybrack FC had informed the Leinster Senior League (LSL) side that Fernando Nuno La-Fuente had been killed in a motorcycle accident. Their game against Arklow Town on Saturday was postponed, with a minute’s silence held before the league’s other fixtures.

The league placed a notice in Irish newspaper The Herald before the LSL chairman, David Moran, became suspicious of the club’s story and dug deeper.

“We rang and we couldn’t get any answers out of them,” Moran told RTÉ Sport. “We checked the hospitals, everywhere. Nobody could find anything about this young fella. Some of his teammates [then] released stuff on social media, saying he went back to Spain four weeks ago.”

After discovering that La-Fuente was in fact alive and well in his homeland, the league issued a statement claiming that “the notification of the death of a Ballybrack player is without foundation”.

Moran also confirmed that the league would look into the matter “through their own internal disciplinary procedures.” As rumours spread on social media that La-Fuente’s demise had been fabricated in order to get the match called off, the club issued an apology on Facebook.

“It has come to the attention of the club, senior players and the management team that a gross error of judgement has occurred, emanating from correspondence sent from a member of the senior management team to the LSL,” their statement said.

“As of this evening, an emergency meeting was held and the person in question has been relieved of all footballing duties within Ballybrack FC. The club has contacted Fernando to confirm his whereabouts, wellbeing and are thankful for his acceptance of our apology on this matter.

“This grave and unacceptable mistake was completely out of character and was made by a person who has been experiencing severe personal difficulties, unbeknownst to any other members of the club.

“At this stage we can only offer our sincere apologies to the Leinster Senior League, our opponents Arklow Town FC and the host of clubs and football people who made contact with us or offered messages of support in recent days.”

Moran has said he will meet the club on Thursday to decide what punishment they will face. “One of the first things we’ll have to do is figure out what rules they broke,” he added. “We’ve never had anything like this before.

“We don’t honestly know why they did it. All they had to say was they were giving a walkover, they’ll get their fine and that’s the end of it.

“It’s very extreme to get a game off. We acted in good faith. We had a minute’s silence at the weekend for that young lad. It’s absolutely ridiculous.”