Board & Management (79 Viewers)
- Thread starter .zero
- Start date
Nonsense. They'll get a fine and that's all. Man City will play CL and will never be excluded despite their 40-odd crimes being investigated by the English FA. This is where UEFA corruption will actually help us, no way City stay and Juventus are excluded without some of the big clubs complaining. Getting rid of £1Bn squad City benefits anyone trying to win the CL.
And fuck Italy too. How the hell do you shuffle the table like that mid season?
And fuck Italy too. How the hell do you shuffle the table like that mid season?
I wonder what happens if the FIGC fail to prove it and then Uefa says exclusion - Couldnt it be easily turned with a nice appeal?
Then again I think the FIGC will deduct some points but more like 5pts than the original 15pts. In this case we are screwed despite no reasonable guidline to support the unexisting law.
Then again I think the FIGC will deduct some points but more like 5pts than the original 15pts. In this case we are screwed despite no reasonable guidline to support the unexisting law.
Ofc but this is where I need Elkann and speak up. Uefa and their gaylord friends at the FIGC will continue to gang rape us so long we stay silent
- - - Updated - - -
Uefa know they can't fuck with man city because they brought the big gun lawyers to defend them last time around. We can't even defend ourselves, ceferin has made this a personal agenda.
- - - Updated - - -
Uefa know they can't fuck with man city because they brought the big gun lawyers to defend them last time around. We can't even defend ourselves, ceferin has made this a personal agenda.
I know but if they set the precedent by banning us then City have to be banned, and Chelsea too who've screwed up with these 8 year contracts. The big clubs will be very vocal about it, even the EPL clubs are preparing to seek compensation. Unlike in Italy, the EPL will have to act to maintain it's image as the 'best league in the world' so UEFA can't not punish City.
eu supreme court might still rule in sl's favor, but it's not likely after the opinion published last december. the opinion isn't binding, judges still tend to follow the opinions, which said that uefa/fifa can indeed punish the breakaway clubs, so the final ruling is expected to follow that
https://curia.europa.eu/juris/fiche...;333;21;RP;1;P;1;C2021/0333/P&lg=&cid=2460852
https://curia.europa.eu/juris/fiche...;333;21;RP;1;P;1;C2021/0333/P&lg=&cid=2460852
Ever since Juventus signed the settlement agreement with UEFA on the club's accounts nothing has changed. To date nobody has ruled any accounting irregularities. The sporting disloyalty is quite random and arbitrary. An exclusion from the cups would be an unjustified act and would only confirm what those who since day 1 saw in this affair a design coming from Slovenia.
[@mirkonicolino)
[@mirkonicolino)
blah blah blah, we'll still get unfairly punished and people will still continue calling us cheaters. Read the online comments. People are scandalized they gave us back the 15pts for now and ask us to be relegated in C.
to beat these mafiosi unfortunately is to use mafiosi means.
saying nothing and showing up in court hoping justice rules ain't it.
to beat these mafiosi unfortunately is to use mafiosi means.
saying nothing and showing up in court hoping justice rules ain't it.
horncastle wrote an other piece on the matter. you can feel the disappointment of a romanista, and he obviously adores mourinho
https://theathletic.com/4444297/2023/04/25/juventus-points-reprieve-chaos/
Inside the chaos: Juventus’ fate is bringing confusion and anger to Italy’s biggest clubs
https://theathletic.com/4444297/2023/04/25/juventus-points-reprieve-chaos/
Inside the chaos: Juventus’ fate is bringing confusion and anger to Italy’s biggest clubs
At 7.15 on Thursday evening, Serie A changed.
Think of it like the departure board at a train station suddenly fluttering as the league updated the table. An hour earlier, amid the swirling flags and plumes of smoke gushing from flares let off by Roma fans escorting the team’s bus to the Stadio Olimpico for their Europa League quarter-final, the Italian Olympic Committee’s Board of Guarantors could hear the din as they issued a verdict in the Salone d’Onore down the street.
Juventus were in Lisbon for their own quarter-final, but the result all the players were following 45 minutes before their game against Sporting Lisbon involved the club’s legal team and the appeal to annul the 15-point penalty slapped down on them last January in a case about player trading. “It’s never pleasant to wait,” Juventus’ chief football officer Francesco Calvo said. They’d hoped to know the outcome before boarding the plane for Portugal the night before but were made to sweat.
The Board of Guarantors had been presented as the last chance saloon for Juventus, not to mention the long list of executives past and present who had been banned by the Italian Football Federation (FIGC) three months ago. Afterwards, the appeal process would, in theory, be exhausted. As such, this was the bonus episode of Juventus: All or Nothing that no one wanted.
The Board of Guarantors could not enter into the merit of the case, only the legitimacy of it. For instance, should the case have been brought to trial in the first place? Could Juventus be tried again after being exonerated a year ago? Was there even an offence considering the subjective nature of transfer valuations? Did the FIGC start and finish its investigation into the club’s transfer business on time? Were there sufficient grounds to get the case reopened three months ago using evidence gathered in a criminal case that is yet to be heard?
Juventus have always denied all wrongdoing and have been unwavering in the belief they had strong grounds for an annulment. “We’ll defend the club in the appropriate institutions. You can do it by picking up points on the pitch” — that was the gist of the address Juventus’ new chairman Gianluca Ferrero and chief executive Maurizio Scanavino delivered to the players after the penalty was imposed. The players have upheld their side of the bargain. Until a recent derailment of three consecutive league defeats, the most recent in controversial fashion in stoppage time against champions-elect Napoli on Sunday night, Juventus’ form since February has been podium worthy in Serie A.
Napoli celebrate scoring in their win over Juventus on Sunday (Photo: Isabella Bonotto/AFP via Getty Images)
It has not been easy to perform over a period book-ended by losses to Napoli. The original decision came a week after Luciano Spalletti’s rampant Partenopei inflicted a 5-1 defeat on Juventus at the Stadio Diego Armando Maradona, a top-of-the-table clash that, had it gone differently, could have closed the gap to four points. Massimiliano Allegri and his players got hit not once but twice: they weren’t only out of the title race — they were out of the top half too after the points deduction.
“It affected us,” Manuel Locatelli said. “We talked about it amongst ourselves. As soon as the sentence became official we were messaging each other on our WhatsApp group. We spoke about it the following day and came to the conclusion that it was pointless thinking about whether we’d get them back or not.” The tension it generated should not be underestimated. Juventus’ former scudetto winner Emanuele Giaccherini related his own experience of playing for Chievo when they were docked points in a display of empathy towards beleaguered Sampdoria who face not only relegation but bankruptcy. Teams can let themselves go. Juventus have not.
“Do you think any other team could have done what we’re doing if, along with all the injuries (to Paul Pogba, Federico Chiesa and Angel Di Maria), the same things had happened to them?” Danilo told The Athletic. People forget this is a team without Gianluigi Buffon and Giorgio Chiellini, Juventus’ old guard. Danilo has had to step up and be captain because age is catching up with 35-year-old Leonardo Bonucci. New leaders have had to emerge. “This team has felt at war with everyone for a while now,” Wojciech Szczesny shrugged. The pressure has been immense.
The Polish goalkeeper had to go off against Sporting after suffering heart palpitations. Nicolo Fagioli, one of the players from Juventus’ “Next Gen” reserve team that Allegri has leaned on, missed a chance to equalise against Lazio and then broke down in tears on the bench after his mistake led to Sassuolo’s winner last weekend. Moise Kean was shown a straight red in stoppage time against Roma for chopping down Gianluca Mancini with a petulant kick 40 seconds after coming on. Each of these incidents can be seen as abstract and in isolation but Allegri, with regard to Kean’s irresponsible sending off, referred to the context and how “what’s happened to Juventus this season has never happened in football before”.
Manuel Locatelli calls for help after Wojciech Szczesny suffered chest pain against Sporting earlier this month (Photo: Marco Bertorello/AFP via Getty Images)
Nevertheless, a cautious optimism, buoyed by a resurgence in results, began to percolate steadily over the last six weeks. There was a noticeable shift in tone from Allegri who went from acknowledging the risk of Juventus being drawn into a relegation battle to insisting his team may not be second in the table but were second in his head and on the pitch. “Are we sure that Juve don’t have 59 points? We’re in Italy,” Roma coach Jose Mourinho cynically observed at a time when they were on 44. “I’ve been here four years not four days.” He was not surprised when the news came through that the points penalty had been suspended.
The written reasons for the decision have yet to be published and the Board of Guarantors has a month to commit them to paper. But Ugo Taucer, the attorney general, gave an insight into his thinking as he left the Olympic Committee’s Palazzo H the night before the verdict came through. He vindicated the FIGC on some points but “on the other hand”, Taucer said, “I fear the application of Article 4 (of the FIGC’s justice code) is unfounded in relation to the points penalty awarded against the club in question and I hope this shortcoming will be assessed again in a new judgment.”
Taucer’s pronouncement came as a shock because the hearing this week was expected to be definitive. Instead, it’s a case of taking two steps forward to go one step back. For now, Juventus have hurdled Atalanta, Inter Milan, AC Milan and Roma in the table, going from seventh to third. “It’s been a ‘bella giornata’,” Allegri said after his team eliminated Sporting to reach the Europa League semi-finals the same evening; a “beautiful day”.
“Juventus celebrate twice” was the front page of the Agnelli-Elkann-owned La Stampa. But those celebrations may only be temporary and weren’t entirely sweet. The Board of Guarantors returned the points penalty to sender. We go back to the future. Juventus will appear before the Federal Court of Appeal as they did last January, a sword of Damocles looming over them.
Juventus celebrate their Europa League quarter-final win over Sporting (Photo: Carlos Costa/ AFP via Getty Images)
The points penalty, considered disproportionate and unmotivated by the Board of Guarantors, will be re-evaluated. That means it could be reinstated, reduced or annulled. Some executives, such as Juventus’ former vice-president Pavel Nedved, Paolo Garimberti and Enrico Vellano, the former CFO of the club’s majority shareholder Exor, will be able to appeal their bans. This partial, temporary and attritional victory didn’t come without losses either. Andrea Agnelli’s two-year suspension was upheld and the appeal process is exhausted for him at least in the sporting domain. The same goes for Fabio Paratici, who finally resigned from Tottenham, and his old deputy Federico Cherubini who has still been attending Juventus games. Calvo expressed his “regret and solidarity for them” prior to kick-off at the Estadio Jose Alvalade.
That night ended with five Italian teams in the semi-finals of UEFA’s three competitions. It’s the first time since 1999 that Serie A has been in the final four of each tournament. But no one among Italy’s current top six, apart from Napoli, knows which one they’ll be participating in next season. For the clubs competing for the Champions League places, the news was a surreality check. When Roma’s general manager Tiago Pinto got wind of the news just moments before his team played Feyenoord, he said: “I don’t know if you use this expression in Italy, but I have to laugh in order not to cry. As a sportsman, if the table we play in for three months doesn’t correspond to reality then the mechanism is wrong.”
In an instant, Juventus leapfrogged Roma who did at least stay in the top four, unlike the Milanesi who endured a major comedown from the high of reaching the Champions League semi-finals for the first time in more than a decade. Milan were second when the points penalty was issued. Rivals Inter were fourth. Look at the form guide since then and the reinstatement of the points on Thursday and Milan’s results would be good enough only for 11th and Inter’s for 12th. Did either of them take Juventus’ fate for granted? How much, if any, influence did the penalty have on their psychology and the decisions of their coaches? Would, for instance, Stefano Pioli and Simone Inzaghi have been as extreme in their rotation between Champions League ties if the points penalty had never been applied?
These are unanswerable questions and blame for their drift through the spring cannot be reduced to a single factor. Champions League earnings from an unexpected run all the way to the final for one of these teams — Milan and Inter have raked in more than €80million (£70m, $88m) each so far — won’t totally offset the lost money from failing to qualify and participate in next year’s group stage.
The hit in expected revenue is estimated at around €25million, which for a club run like Milan is very close to the maximum fee they’re prepared to pay for a player. It is one Fikayo Tomori. The swing away from qualification caused by Thursday’s decision is dramatic. Statistical models upgraded Juventus’ chances of making the Champions League to 84 per cent. Milan’s chances of qualifying through their league position were downgraded to 38 per cent, and Inter’s to 15 per cent.
FOMO at Inter had already started to manifest itself before the evaporation of Juventus’ points penalty to the extent that speculation arose about the club mulling over a Champions League bonus to wake the players up in the run-in. “That would be a negative thing to do. The players shouldn’t be mercenaries,” Inter chief executive Giuseppe Marotta said. “We shouldn’t have to incentivise them to do something that’s in their grasp. It would be depressing. I got rid of the top-four bonus when I arrived. I can’t let myself think they have to be motivated by money.”
What the models can’t predict is the contents of the Board of Guarantors’ written reasons and whether or not Juventus’ points penalty gets reintroduced, downsized or removed. They can’t anticipate another, separate deduction either. Around 10 days ago, the FIGC’s federal prosecutor’s office notified Juventus it had concluded another investigation into how the club accounted for salary payments during COVID-19, relationships with agents and alleged partnerships with other teams. Disciplinary proceedings are expected next month.
Then there is UEFA’s own investigation, another variable absent from the model. “We’re convinced we have always acted in the right and this conviction remains in the wake of today’s decision,” Calvo said. “We’ve had the fullest dialogue, with the utmost respect, since January when the ruling was made.” A ruling that Allegri feels messed with his team: “On the one hand you could say this penalty galvanised us. On the other, if they hadn’t deducted the points maybe we’d have 10 points more than we do now because it’s hard to explain the impact it has had on us mentally.”
Massimiliano Allegri addressing in Lisbon last week (Photo: Filipe Amorim/AFP via Getty Images)
The league remains shrouded in uncertainty. “All we can do is focus on what we can control,” Pioli said. “The sooner the league table is definitive, the better it is for everyone.” Considering the active cases, Serie A might not be set in stone until the formal end of the season on June 30, which is more than three weeks after the final whistle blows on the last round of games. “From a legal perspective I can’t give an opinion because I don’t have the expertise,” Lazio coach Maurizio Sarri said. “As a sportsman, the league isn’t a level playing field. It isn’t if the standings are kept like that for three months and then they say: ‘I’m sorry, we made a mistake. It might actually be this’. As for the sporting justice (system), I hope someone has the good taste to resign.”
The league’s credibility and adequacy have taken hit after hit. Luigi De Siervo, the chief executive of Serie A, expressed his “disappointment” that the FIGC “wanted to intervene during the season” and his hope that the “sanction be reconsidered”. Then on Saturday, Gabriele Gravina, the president of the FIGC, intervened in the case of Romelu Lukaku — whose second yellow card in the first leg of the Coppa Italia semi-final, shown amid deplorable racist chanting as he celebrated scoring an equalising penalty in Turin — was insensitively upheld. Aware of the optics, Gravina compassionately and sensationally overruled his own prosecutors.
These are the disorienting shifting sands of Italian football. No one knows where anyone stands. No one apart from Mourinho: “We’re in Italy.”
Think of it like the departure board at a train station suddenly fluttering as the league updated the table. An hour earlier, amid the swirling flags and plumes of smoke gushing from flares let off by Roma fans escorting the team’s bus to the Stadio Olimpico for their Europa League quarter-final, the Italian Olympic Committee’s Board of Guarantors could hear the din as they issued a verdict in the Salone d’Onore down the street.
Juventus were in Lisbon for their own quarter-final, but the result all the players were following 45 minutes before their game against Sporting Lisbon involved the club’s legal team and the appeal to annul the 15-point penalty slapped down on them last January in a case about player trading. “It’s never pleasant to wait,” Juventus’ chief football officer Francesco Calvo said. They’d hoped to know the outcome before boarding the plane for Portugal the night before but were made to sweat.
The Board of Guarantors had been presented as the last chance saloon for Juventus, not to mention the long list of executives past and present who had been banned by the Italian Football Federation (FIGC) three months ago. Afterwards, the appeal process would, in theory, be exhausted. As such, this was the bonus episode of Juventus: All or Nothing that no one wanted.
The Board of Guarantors could not enter into the merit of the case, only the legitimacy of it. For instance, should the case have been brought to trial in the first place? Could Juventus be tried again after being exonerated a year ago? Was there even an offence considering the subjective nature of transfer valuations? Did the FIGC start and finish its investigation into the club’s transfer business on time? Were there sufficient grounds to get the case reopened three months ago using evidence gathered in a criminal case that is yet to be heard?
Juventus have always denied all wrongdoing and have been unwavering in the belief they had strong grounds for an annulment. “We’ll defend the club in the appropriate institutions. You can do it by picking up points on the pitch” — that was the gist of the address Juventus’ new chairman Gianluca Ferrero and chief executive Maurizio Scanavino delivered to the players after the penalty was imposed. The players have upheld their side of the bargain. Until a recent derailment of three consecutive league defeats, the most recent in controversial fashion in stoppage time against champions-elect Napoli on Sunday night, Juventus’ form since February has been podium worthy in Serie A.
Napoli celebrate scoring in their win over Juventus on Sunday (Photo: Isabella Bonotto/AFP via Getty Images)
It has not been easy to perform over a period book-ended by losses to Napoli. The original decision came a week after Luciano Spalletti’s rampant Partenopei inflicted a 5-1 defeat on Juventus at the Stadio Diego Armando Maradona, a top-of-the-table clash that, had it gone differently, could have closed the gap to four points. Massimiliano Allegri and his players got hit not once but twice: they weren’t only out of the title race — they were out of the top half too after the points deduction.
“It affected us,” Manuel Locatelli said. “We talked about it amongst ourselves. As soon as the sentence became official we were messaging each other on our WhatsApp group. We spoke about it the following day and came to the conclusion that it was pointless thinking about whether we’d get them back or not.” The tension it generated should not be underestimated. Juventus’ former scudetto winner Emanuele Giaccherini related his own experience of playing for Chievo when they were docked points in a display of empathy towards beleaguered Sampdoria who face not only relegation but bankruptcy. Teams can let themselves go. Juventus have not.
“Do you think any other team could have done what we’re doing if, along with all the injuries (to Paul Pogba, Federico Chiesa and Angel Di Maria), the same things had happened to them?” Danilo told The Athletic. People forget this is a team without Gianluigi Buffon and Giorgio Chiellini, Juventus’ old guard. Danilo has had to step up and be captain because age is catching up with 35-year-old Leonardo Bonucci. New leaders have had to emerge. “This team has felt at war with everyone for a while now,” Wojciech Szczesny shrugged. The pressure has been immense.
The Polish goalkeeper had to go off against Sporting after suffering heart palpitations. Nicolo Fagioli, one of the players from Juventus’ “Next Gen” reserve team that Allegri has leaned on, missed a chance to equalise against Lazio and then broke down in tears on the bench after his mistake led to Sassuolo’s winner last weekend. Moise Kean was shown a straight red in stoppage time against Roma for chopping down Gianluca Mancini with a petulant kick 40 seconds after coming on. Each of these incidents can be seen as abstract and in isolation but Allegri, with regard to Kean’s irresponsible sending off, referred to the context and how “what’s happened to Juventus this season has never happened in football before”.
Manuel Locatelli calls for help after Wojciech Szczesny suffered chest pain against Sporting earlier this month (Photo: Marco Bertorello/AFP via Getty Images)
Nevertheless, a cautious optimism, buoyed by a resurgence in results, began to percolate steadily over the last six weeks. There was a noticeable shift in tone from Allegri who went from acknowledging the risk of Juventus being drawn into a relegation battle to insisting his team may not be second in the table but were second in his head and on the pitch. “Are we sure that Juve don’t have 59 points? We’re in Italy,” Roma coach Jose Mourinho cynically observed at a time when they were on 44. “I’ve been here four years not four days.” He was not surprised when the news came through that the points penalty had been suspended.
The written reasons for the decision have yet to be published and the Board of Guarantors has a month to commit them to paper. But Ugo Taucer, the attorney general, gave an insight into his thinking as he left the Olympic Committee’s Palazzo H the night before the verdict came through. He vindicated the FIGC on some points but “on the other hand”, Taucer said, “I fear the application of Article 4 (of the FIGC’s justice code) is unfounded in relation to the points penalty awarded against the club in question and I hope this shortcoming will be assessed again in a new judgment.”
Taucer’s pronouncement came as a shock because the hearing this week was expected to be definitive. Instead, it’s a case of taking two steps forward to go one step back. For now, Juventus have hurdled Atalanta, Inter Milan, AC Milan and Roma in the table, going from seventh to third. “It’s been a ‘bella giornata’,” Allegri said after his team eliminated Sporting to reach the Europa League semi-finals the same evening; a “beautiful day”.
“Juventus celebrate twice” was the front page of the Agnelli-Elkann-owned La Stampa. But those celebrations may only be temporary and weren’t entirely sweet. The Board of Guarantors returned the points penalty to sender. We go back to the future. Juventus will appear before the Federal Court of Appeal as they did last January, a sword of Damocles looming over them.
Juventus celebrate their Europa League quarter-final win over Sporting (Photo: Carlos Costa/ AFP via Getty Images)
The points penalty, considered disproportionate and unmotivated by the Board of Guarantors, will be re-evaluated. That means it could be reinstated, reduced or annulled. Some executives, such as Juventus’ former vice-president Pavel Nedved, Paolo Garimberti and Enrico Vellano, the former CFO of the club’s majority shareholder Exor, will be able to appeal their bans. This partial, temporary and attritional victory didn’t come without losses either. Andrea Agnelli’s two-year suspension was upheld and the appeal process is exhausted for him at least in the sporting domain. The same goes for Fabio Paratici, who finally resigned from Tottenham, and his old deputy Federico Cherubini who has still been attending Juventus games. Calvo expressed his “regret and solidarity for them” prior to kick-off at the Estadio Jose Alvalade.
That night ended with five Italian teams in the semi-finals of UEFA’s three competitions. It’s the first time since 1999 that Serie A has been in the final four of each tournament. But no one among Italy’s current top six, apart from Napoli, knows which one they’ll be participating in next season. For the clubs competing for the Champions League places, the news was a surreality check. When Roma’s general manager Tiago Pinto got wind of the news just moments before his team played Feyenoord, he said: “I don’t know if you use this expression in Italy, but I have to laugh in order not to cry. As a sportsman, if the table we play in for three months doesn’t correspond to reality then the mechanism is wrong.”
In an instant, Juventus leapfrogged Roma who did at least stay in the top four, unlike the Milanesi who endured a major comedown from the high of reaching the Champions League semi-finals for the first time in more than a decade. Milan were second when the points penalty was issued. Rivals Inter were fourth. Look at the form guide since then and the reinstatement of the points on Thursday and Milan’s results would be good enough only for 11th and Inter’s for 12th. Did either of them take Juventus’ fate for granted? How much, if any, influence did the penalty have on their psychology and the decisions of their coaches? Would, for instance, Stefano Pioli and Simone Inzaghi have been as extreme in their rotation between Champions League ties if the points penalty had never been applied?
These are unanswerable questions and blame for their drift through the spring cannot be reduced to a single factor. Champions League earnings from an unexpected run all the way to the final for one of these teams — Milan and Inter have raked in more than €80million (£70m, $88m) each so far — won’t totally offset the lost money from failing to qualify and participate in next year’s group stage.
The hit in expected revenue is estimated at around €25million, which for a club run like Milan is very close to the maximum fee they’re prepared to pay for a player. It is one Fikayo Tomori. The swing away from qualification caused by Thursday’s decision is dramatic. Statistical models upgraded Juventus’ chances of making the Champions League to 84 per cent. Milan’s chances of qualifying through their league position were downgraded to 38 per cent, and Inter’s to 15 per cent.
FOMO at Inter had already started to manifest itself before the evaporation of Juventus’ points penalty to the extent that speculation arose about the club mulling over a Champions League bonus to wake the players up in the run-in. “That would be a negative thing to do. The players shouldn’t be mercenaries,” Inter chief executive Giuseppe Marotta said. “We shouldn’t have to incentivise them to do something that’s in their grasp. It would be depressing. I got rid of the top-four bonus when I arrived. I can’t let myself think they have to be motivated by money.”
What the models can’t predict is the contents of the Board of Guarantors’ written reasons and whether or not Juventus’ points penalty gets reintroduced, downsized or removed. They can’t anticipate another, separate deduction either. Around 10 days ago, the FIGC’s federal prosecutor’s office notified Juventus it had concluded another investigation into how the club accounted for salary payments during COVID-19, relationships with agents and alleged partnerships with other teams. Disciplinary proceedings are expected next month.
Then there is UEFA’s own investigation, another variable absent from the model. “We’re convinced we have always acted in the right and this conviction remains in the wake of today’s decision,” Calvo said. “We’ve had the fullest dialogue, with the utmost respect, since January when the ruling was made.” A ruling that Allegri feels messed with his team: “On the one hand you could say this penalty galvanised us. On the other, if they hadn’t deducted the points maybe we’d have 10 points more than we do now because it’s hard to explain the impact it has had on us mentally.”
Massimiliano Allegri addressing in Lisbon last week (Photo: Filipe Amorim/AFP via Getty Images)
The league remains shrouded in uncertainty. “All we can do is focus on what we can control,” Pioli said. “The sooner the league table is definitive, the better it is for everyone.” Considering the active cases, Serie A might not be set in stone until the formal end of the season on June 30, which is more than three weeks after the final whistle blows on the last round of games. “From a legal perspective I can’t give an opinion because I don’t have the expertise,” Lazio coach Maurizio Sarri said. “As a sportsman, the league isn’t a level playing field. It isn’t if the standings are kept like that for three months and then they say: ‘I’m sorry, we made a mistake. It might actually be this’. As for the sporting justice (system), I hope someone has the good taste to resign.”
The league’s credibility and adequacy have taken hit after hit. Luigi De Siervo, the chief executive of Serie A, expressed his “disappointment” that the FIGC “wanted to intervene during the season” and his hope that the “sanction be reconsidered”. Then on Saturday, Gabriele Gravina, the president of the FIGC, intervened in the case of Romelu Lukaku — whose second yellow card in the first leg of the Coppa Italia semi-final, shown amid deplorable racist chanting as he celebrated scoring an equalising penalty in Turin — was insensitively upheld. Aware of the optics, Gravina compassionately and sensationally overruled his own prosecutors.
These are the disorienting shifting sands of Italian football. No one knows where anyone stands. No one apart from Mourinho: “We’re in Italy.”
horncastle wrote an other piece on the matter. you can feel the disappointment of a romanista, and he obviously adores mourinho
https://theathletic.com/4444297/2023/04/25/juventus-points-reprieve-chaos/
Inside the chaos: Juventus’ fate is bringing confusion and anger to Italy’s biggest clubs
https://theathletic.com/4444297/2023/04/25/juventus-points-reprieve-chaos/
Inside the chaos: Juventus’ fate is bringing confusion and anger to Italy’s biggest clubs
At 7.15 on Thursday evening, Serie A changed.
Think of it like the departure board at a train station suddenly fluttering as the league updated the table. An hour earlier, amid the swirling flags and plumes of smoke gushing from flares let off by Roma fans escorting the team’s bus to the Stadio Olimpico for their Europa League quarter-final, the Italian Olympic Committee’s Board of Guarantors could hear the din as they issued a verdict in the Salone d’Onore down the street.
Juventus were in Lisbon for their own quarter-final, but the result all the players were following 45 minutes before their game against Sporting Lisbon involved the club’s legal team and the appeal to annul the 15-point penalty slapped down on them last January in a case about player trading. “It’s never pleasant to wait,” Juventus’ chief football officer Francesco Calvo said. They’d hoped to know the outcome before boarding the plane for Portugal the night before but were made to sweat.
The Board of Guarantors had been presented as the last chance saloon for Juventus, not to mention the long list of executives past and present who had been banned by the Italian Football Federation (FIGC) three months ago. Afterwards, the appeal process would, in theory, be exhausted. As such, this was the bonus episode of Juventus: All or Nothing that no one wanted.
The Board of Guarantors could not enter into the merit of the case, only the legitimacy of it. For instance, should the case have been brought to trial in the first place? Could Juventus be tried again after being exonerated a year ago? Was there even an offence considering the subjective nature of transfer valuations? Did the FIGC start and finish its investigation into the club’s transfer business on time? Were there sufficient grounds to get the case reopened three months ago using evidence gathered in a criminal case that is yet to be heard?
Juventus have always denied all wrongdoing and have been unwavering in the belief they had strong grounds for an annulment. “We’ll defend the club in the appropriate institutions. You can do it by picking up points on the pitch” — that was the gist of the address Juventus’ new chairman Gianluca Ferrero and chief executive Maurizio Scanavino delivered to the players after the penalty was imposed. The players have upheld their side of the bargain. Until a recent derailment of three consecutive league defeats, the most recent in controversial fashion in stoppage time against champions-elect Napoli on Sunday night, Juventus’ form since February has been podium worthy in Serie A.
Napoli celebrate scoring in their win over Juventus on Sunday (Photo: Isabella Bonotto/AFP via Getty Images)
It has not been easy to perform over a period book-ended by losses to Napoli. The original decision came a week after Luciano Spalletti’s rampant Partenopei inflicted a 5-1 defeat on Juventus at the Stadio Diego Armando Maradona, a top-of-the-table clash that, had it gone differently, could have closed the gap to four points. Massimiliano Allegri and his players got hit not once but twice: they weren’t only out of the title race — they were out of the top half too after the points deduction.
“It affected us,” Manuel Locatelli said. “We talked about it amongst ourselves. As soon as the sentence became official we were messaging each other on our WhatsApp group. We spoke about it the following day and came to the conclusion that it was pointless thinking about whether we’d get them back or not.” The tension it generated should not be underestimated. Juventus’ former scudetto winner Emanuele Giaccherini related his own experience of playing for Chievo when they were docked points in a display of empathy towards beleaguered Sampdoria who face not only relegation but bankruptcy. Teams can let themselves go. Juventus have not.
“Do you think any other team could have done what we’re doing if, along with all the injuries (to Paul Pogba, Federico Chiesa and Angel Di Maria), the same things had happened to them?” Danilo told The Athletic. People forget this is a team without Gianluigi Buffon and Giorgio Chiellini, Juventus’ old guard. Danilo has had to step up and be captain because age is catching up with 35-year-old Leonardo Bonucci. New leaders have had to emerge. “This team has felt at war with everyone for a while now,” Wojciech Szczesny shrugged. The pressure has been immense.
The Polish goalkeeper had to go off against Sporting after suffering heart palpitations. Nicolo Fagioli, one of the players from Juventus’ “Next Gen” reserve team that Allegri has leaned on, missed a chance to equalise against Lazio and then broke down in tears on the bench after his mistake led to Sassuolo’s winner last weekend. Moise Kean was shown a straight red in stoppage time against Roma for chopping down Gianluca Mancini with a petulant kick 40 seconds after coming on. Each of these incidents can be seen as abstract and in isolation but Allegri, with regard to Kean’s irresponsible sending off, referred to the context and how “what’s happened to Juventus this season has never happened in football before”.
Manuel Locatelli calls for help after Wojciech Szczesny suffered chest pain against Sporting earlier this month (Photo: Marco Bertorello/AFP via Getty Images)
Nevertheless, a cautious optimism, buoyed by a resurgence in results, began to percolate steadily over the last six weeks. There was a noticeable shift in tone from Allegri who went from acknowledging the risk of Juventus being drawn into a relegation battle to insisting his team may not be second in the table but were second in his head and on the pitch. “Are we sure that Juve don’t have 59 points? We’re in Italy,” Roma coach Jose Mourinho cynically observed at a time when they were on 44. “I’ve been here four years not four days.” He was not surprised when the news came through that the points penalty had been suspended.
The written reasons for the decision have yet to be published and the Board of Guarantors has a month to commit them to paper. But Ugo Taucer, the attorney general, gave an insight into his thinking as he left the Olympic Committee’s Palazzo H the night before the verdict came through. He vindicated the FIGC on some points but “on the other hand”, Taucer said, “I fear the application of Article 4 (of the FIGC’s justice code) is unfounded in relation to the points penalty awarded against the club in question and I hope this shortcoming will be assessed again in a new judgment.”
Taucer’s pronouncement came as a shock because the hearing this week was expected to be definitive. Instead, it’s a case of taking two steps forward to go one step back. For now, Juventus have hurdled Atalanta, Inter Milan, AC Milan and Roma in the table, going from seventh to third. “It’s been a ‘bella giornata’,” Allegri said after his team eliminated Sporting to reach the Europa League semi-finals the same evening; a “beautiful day”.
“Juventus celebrate twice” was the front page of the Agnelli-Elkann-owned La Stampa. But those celebrations may only be temporary and weren’t entirely sweet. The Board of Guarantors returned the points penalty to sender. We go back to the future. Juventus will appear before the Federal Court of Appeal as they did last January, a sword of Damocles looming over them.
Juventus celebrate their Europa League quarter-final win over Sporting (Photo: Carlos Costa/ AFP via Getty Images)
The points penalty, considered disproportionate and unmotivated by the Board of Guarantors, will be re-evaluated. That means it could be reinstated, reduced or annulled. Some executives, such as Juventus’ former vice-president Pavel Nedved, Paolo Garimberti and Enrico Vellano, the former CFO of the club’s majority shareholder Exor, will be able to appeal their bans. This partial, temporary and attritional victory didn’t come without losses either. Andrea Agnelli’s two-year suspension was upheld and the appeal process is exhausted for him at least in the sporting domain. The same goes for Fabio Paratici, who finally resigned from Tottenham, and his old deputy Federico Cherubini who has still been attending Juventus games. Calvo expressed his “regret and solidarity for them” prior to kick-off at the Estadio Jose Alvalade.
That night ended with five Italian teams in the semi-finals of UEFA’s three competitions. It’s the first time since 1999 that Serie A has been in the final four of each tournament. But no one among Italy’s current top six, apart from Napoli, knows which one they’ll be participating in next season. For the clubs competing for the Champions League places, the news was a surreality check. When Roma’s general manager Tiago Pinto got wind of the news just moments before his team played Feyenoord, he said: “I don’t know if you use this expression in Italy, but I have to laugh in order not to cry. As a sportsman, if the table we play in for three months doesn’t correspond to reality then the mechanism is wrong.”
In an instant, Juventus leapfrogged Roma who did at least stay in the top four, unlike the Milanesi who endured a major comedown from the high of reaching the Champions League semi-finals for the first time in more than a decade. Milan were second when the points penalty was issued. Rivals Inter were fourth. Look at the form guide since then and the reinstatement of the points on Thursday and Milan’s results would be good enough only for 11th and Inter’s for 12th. Did either of them take Juventus’ fate for granted? How much, if any, influence did the penalty have on their psychology and the decisions of their coaches? Would, for instance, Stefano Pioli and Simone Inzaghi have been as extreme in their rotation between Champions League ties if the points penalty had never been applied?
These are unanswerable questions and blame for their drift through the spring cannot be reduced to a single factor. Champions League earnings from an unexpected run all the way to the final for one of these teams — Milan and Inter have raked in more than €80million (£70m, $88m) each so far — won’t totally offset the lost money from failing to qualify and participate in next year’s group stage.
The hit in expected revenue is estimated at around €25million, which for a club run like Milan is very close to the maximum fee they’re prepared to pay for a player. It is one Fikayo Tomori. The swing away from qualification caused by Thursday’s decision is dramatic. Statistical models upgraded Juventus’ chances of making the Champions League to 84 per cent. Milan’s chances of qualifying through their league position were downgraded to 38 per cent, and Inter’s to 15 per cent.
FOMO at Inter had already started to manifest itself before the evaporation of Juventus’ points penalty to the extent that speculation arose about the club mulling over a Champions League bonus to wake the players up in the run-in. “That would be a negative thing to do. The players shouldn’t be mercenaries,” Inter chief executive Giuseppe Marotta said. “We shouldn’t have to incentivise them to do something that’s in their grasp. It would be depressing. I got rid of the top-four bonus when I arrived. I can’t let myself think they have to be motivated by money.”
What the models can’t predict is the contents of the Board of Guarantors’ written reasons and whether or not Juventus’ points penalty gets reintroduced, downsized or removed. They can’t anticipate another, separate deduction either. Around 10 days ago, the FIGC’s federal prosecutor’s office notified Juventus it had concluded another investigation into how the club accounted for salary payments during COVID-19, relationships with agents and alleged partnerships with other teams. Disciplinary proceedings are expected next month.
Then there is UEFA’s own investigation, another variable absent from the model. “We’re convinced we have always acted in the right and this conviction remains in the wake of today’s decision,” Calvo said. “We’ve had the fullest dialogue, with the utmost respect, since January when the ruling was made.” A ruling that Allegri feels messed with his team: “On the one hand you could say this penalty galvanised us. On the other, if they hadn’t deducted the points maybe we’d have 10 points more than we do now because it’s hard to explain the impact it has had on us mentally.”
Massimiliano Allegri addressing in Lisbon last week (Photo: Filipe Amorim/AFP via Getty Images)
The league remains shrouded in uncertainty. “All we can do is focus on what we can control,” Pioli said. “The sooner the league table is definitive, the better it is for everyone.” Considering the active cases, Serie A might not be set in stone until the formal end of the season on June 30, which is more than three weeks after the final whistle blows on the last round of games. “From a legal perspective I can’t give an opinion because I don’t have the expertise,” Lazio coach Maurizio Sarri said. “As a sportsman, the league isn’t a level playing field. It isn’t if the standings are kept like that for three months and then they say: ‘I’m sorry, we made a mistake. It might actually be this’. As for the sporting justice (system), I hope someone has the good taste to resign.”
The league’s credibility and adequacy have taken hit after hit. Luigi De Siervo, the chief executive of Serie A, expressed his “disappointment” that the FIGC “wanted to intervene during the season” and his hope that the “sanction be reconsidered”. Then on Saturday, Gabriele Gravina, the president of the FIGC, intervened in the case of Romelu Lukaku — whose second yellow card in the first leg of the Coppa Italia semi-final, shown amid deplorable racist chanting as he celebrated scoring an equalising penalty in Turin — was insensitively upheld. Aware of the optics, Gravina compassionately and sensationally overruled his own prosecutors.
These are the disorienting shifting sands of Italian football. No one knows where anyone stands. No one apart from Mourinho: “We’re in Italy.”
Think of it like the departure board at a train station suddenly fluttering as the league updated the table. An hour earlier, amid the swirling flags and plumes of smoke gushing from flares let off by Roma fans escorting the team’s bus to the Stadio Olimpico for their Europa League quarter-final, the Italian Olympic Committee’s Board of Guarantors could hear the din as they issued a verdict in the Salone d’Onore down the street.
Juventus were in Lisbon for their own quarter-final, but the result all the players were following 45 minutes before their game against Sporting Lisbon involved the club’s legal team and the appeal to annul the 15-point penalty slapped down on them last January in a case about player trading. “It’s never pleasant to wait,” Juventus’ chief football officer Francesco Calvo said. They’d hoped to know the outcome before boarding the plane for Portugal the night before but were made to sweat.
The Board of Guarantors had been presented as the last chance saloon for Juventus, not to mention the long list of executives past and present who had been banned by the Italian Football Federation (FIGC) three months ago. Afterwards, the appeal process would, in theory, be exhausted. As such, this was the bonus episode of Juventus: All or Nothing that no one wanted.
The Board of Guarantors could not enter into the merit of the case, only the legitimacy of it. For instance, should the case have been brought to trial in the first place? Could Juventus be tried again after being exonerated a year ago? Was there even an offence considering the subjective nature of transfer valuations? Did the FIGC start and finish its investigation into the club’s transfer business on time? Were there sufficient grounds to get the case reopened three months ago using evidence gathered in a criminal case that is yet to be heard?
Juventus have always denied all wrongdoing and have been unwavering in the belief they had strong grounds for an annulment. “We’ll defend the club in the appropriate institutions. You can do it by picking up points on the pitch” — that was the gist of the address Juventus’ new chairman Gianluca Ferrero and chief executive Maurizio Scanavino delivered to the players after the penalty was imposed. The players have upheld their side of the bargain. Until a recent derailment of three consecutive league defeats, the most recent in controversial fashion in stoppage time against champions-elect Napoli on Sunday night, Juventus’ form since February has been podium worthy in Serie A.
Napoli celebrate scoring in their win over Juventus on Sunday (Photo: Isabella Bonotto/AFP via Getty Images)
It has not been easy to perform over a period book-ended by losses to Napoli. The original decision came a week after Luciano Spalletti’s rampant Partenopei inflicted a 5-1 defeat on Juventus at the Stadio Diego Armando Maradona, a top-of-the-table clash that, had it gone differently, could have closed the gap to four points. Massimiliano Allegri and his players got hit not once but twice: they weren’t only out of the title race — they were out of the top half too after the points deduction.
“It affected us,” Manuel Locatelli said. “We talked about it amongst ourselves. As soon as the sentence became official we were messaging each other on our WhatsApp group. We spoke about it the following day and came to the conclusion that it was pointless thinking about whether we’d get them back or not.” The tension it generated should not be underestimated. Juventus’ former scudetto winner Emanuele Giaccherini related his own experience of playing for Chievo when they were docked points in a display of empathy towards beleaguered Sampdoria who face not only relegation but bankruptcy. Teams can let themselves go. Juventus have not.
“Do you think any other team could have done what we’re doing if, along with all the injuries (to Paul Pogba, Federico Chiesa and Angel Di Maria), the same things had happened to them?” Danilo told The Athletic. People forget this is a team without Gianluigi Buffon and Giorgio Chiellini, Juventus’ old guard. Danilo has had to step up and be captain because age is catching up with 35-year-old Leonardo Bonucci. New leaders have had to emerge. “This team has felt at war with everyone for a while now,” Wojciech Szczesny shrugged. The pressure has been immense.
The Polish goalkeeper had to go off against Sporting after suffering heart palpitations. Nicolo Fagioli, one of the players from Juventus’ “Next Gen” reserve team that Allegri has leaned on, missed a chance to equalise against Lazio and then broke down in tears on the bench after his mistake led to Sassuolo’s winner last weekend. Moise Kean was shown a straight red in stoppage time against Roma for chopping down Gianluca Mancini with a petulant kick 40 seconds after coming on. Each of these incidents can be seen as abstract and in isolation but Allegri, with regard to Kean’s irresponsible sending off, referred to the context and how “what’s happened to Juventus this season has never happened in football before”.
Manuel Locatelli calls for help after Wojciech Szczesny suffered chest pain against Sporting earlier this month (Photo: Marco Bertorello/AFP via Getty Images)
Nevertheless, a cautious optimism, buoyed by a resurgence in results, began to percolate steadily over the last six weeks. There was a noticeable shift in tone from Allegri who went from acknowledging the risk of Juventus being drawn into a relegation battle to insisting his team may not be second in the table but were second in his head and on the pitch. “Are we sure that Juve don’t have 59 points? We’re in Italy,” Roma coach Jose Mourinho cynically observed at a time when they were on 44. “I’ve been here four years not four days.” He was not surprised when the news came through that the points penalty had been suspended.
The written reasons for the decision have yet to be published and the Board of Guarantors has a month to commit them to paper. But Ugo Taucer, the attorney general, gave an insight into his thinking as he left the Olympic Committee’s Palazzo H the night before the verdict came through. He vindicated the FIGC on some points but “on the other hand”, Taucer said, “I fear the application of Article 4 (of the FIGC’s justice code) is unfounded in relation to the points penalty awarded against the club in question and I hope this shortcoming will be assessed again in a new judgment.”
Taucer’s pronouncement came as a shock because the hearing this week was expected to be definitive. Instead, it’s a case of taking two steps forward to go one step back. For now, Juventus have hurdled Atalanta, Inter Milan, AC Milan and Roma in the table, going from seventh to third. “It’s been a ‘bella giornata’,” Allegri said after his team eliminated Sporting to reach the Europa League semi-finals the same evening; a “beautiful day”.
“Juventus celebrate twice” was the front page of the Agnelli-Elkann-owned La Stampa. But those celebrations may only be temporary and weren’t entirely sweet. The Board of Guarantors returned the points penalty to sender. We go back to the future. Juventus will appear before the Federal Court of Appeal as they did last January, a sword of Damocles looming over them.
Juventus celebrate their Europa League quarter-final win over Sporting (Photo: Carlos Costa/ AFP via Getty Images)
The points penalty, considered disproportionate and unmotivated by the Board of Guarantors, will be re-evaluated. That means it could be reinstated, reduced or annulled. Some executives, such as Juventus’ former vice-president Pavel Nedved, Paolo Garimberti and Enrico Vellano, the former CFO of the club’s majority shareholder Exor, will be able to appeal their bans. This partial, temporary and attritional victory didn’t come without losses either. Andrea Agnelli’s two-year suspension was upheld and the appeal process is exhausted for him at least in the sporting domain. The same goes for Fabio Paratici, who finally resigned from Tottenham, and his old deputy Federico Cherubini who has still been attending Juventus games. Calvo expressed his “regret and solidarity for them” prior to kick-off at the Estadio Jose Alvalade.
That night ended with five Italian teams in the semi-finals of UEFA’s three competitions. It’s the first time since 1999 that Serie A has been in the final four of each tournament. But no one among Italy’s current top six, apart from Napoli, knows which one they’ll be participating in next season. For the clubs competing for the Champions League places, the news was a surreality check. When Roma’s general manager Tiago Pinto got wind of the news just moments before his team played Feyenoord, he said: “I don’t know if you use this expression in Italy, but I have to laugh in order not to cry. As a sportsman, if the table we play in for three months doesn’t correspond to reality then the mechanism is wrong.”
In an instant, Juventus leapfrogged Roma who did at least stay in the top four, unlike the Milanesi who endured a major comedown from the high of reaching the Champions League semi-finals for the first time in more than a decade. Milan were second when the points penalty was issued. Rivals Inter were fourth. Look at the form guide since then and the reinstatement of the points on Thursday and Milan’s results would be good enough only for 11th and Inter’s for 12th. Did either of them take Juventus’ fate for granted? How much, if any, influence did the penalty have on their psychology and the decisions of their coaches? Would, for instance, Stefano Pioli and Simone Inzaghi have been as extreme in their rotation between Champions League ties if the points penalty had never been applied?
These are unanswerable questions and blame for their drift through the spring cannot be reduced to a single factor. Champions League earnings from an unexpected run all the way to the final for one of these teams — Milan and Inter have raked in more than €80million (£70m, $88m) each so far — won’t totally offset the lost money from failing to qualify and participate in next year’s group stage.
The hit in expected revenue is estimated at around €25million, which for a club run like Milan is very close to the maximum fee they’re prepared to pay for a player. It is one Fikayo Tomori. The swing away from qualification caused by Thursday’s decision is dramatic. Statistical models upgraded Juventus’ chances of making the Champions League to 84 per cent. Milan’s chances of qualifying through their league position were downgraded to 38 per cent, and Inter’s to 15 per cent.
FOMO at Inter had already started to manifest itself before the evaporation of Juventus’ points penalty to the extent that speculation arose about the club mulling over a Champions League bonus to wake the players up in the run-in. “That would be a negative thing to do. The players shouldn’t be mercenaries,” Inter chief executive Giuseppe Marotta said. “We shouldn’t have to incentivise them to do something that’s in their grasp. It would be depressing. I got rid of the top-four bonus when I arrived. I can’t let myself think they have to be motivated by money.”
What the models can’t predict is the contents of the Board of Guarantors’ written reasons and whether or not Juventus’ points penalty gets reintroduced, downsized or removed. They can’t anticipate another, separate deduction either. Around 10 days ago, the FIGC’s federal prosecutor’s office notified Juventus it had concluded another investigation into how the club accounted for salary payments during COVID-19, relationships with agents and alleged partnerships with other teams. Disciplinary proceedings are expected next month.
Then there is UEFA’s own investigation, another variable absent from the model. “We’re convinced we have always acted in the right and this conviction remains in the wake of today’s decision,” Calvo said. “We’ve had the fullest dialogue, with the utmost respect, since January when the ruling was made.” A ruling that Allegri feels messed with his team: “On the one hand you could say this penalty galvanised us. On the other, if they hadn’t deducted the points maybe we’d have 10 points more than we do now because it’s hard to explain the impact it has had on us mentally.”
Massimiliano Allegri addressing in Lisbon last week (Photo: Filipe Amorim/AFP via Getty Images)
The league remains shrouded in uncertainty. “All we can do is focus on what we can control,” Pioli said. “The sooner the league table is definitive, the better it is for everyone.” Considering the active cases, Serie A might not be set in stone until the formal end of the season on June 30, which is more than three weeks after the final whistle blows on the last round of games. “From a legal perspective I can’t give an opinion because I don’t have the expertise,” Lazio coach Maurizio Sarri said. “As a sportsman, the league isn’t a level playing field. It isn’t if the standings are kept like that for three months and then they say: ‘I’m sorry, we made a mistake. It might actually be this’. As for the sporting justice (system), I hope someone has the good taste to resign.”
The league’s credibility and adequacy have taken hit after hit. Luigi De Siervo, the chief executive of Serie A, expressed his “disappointment” that the FIGC “wanted to intervene during the season” and his hope that the “sanction be reconsidered”. Then on Saturday, Gabriele Gravina, the president of the FIGC, intervened in the case of Romelu Lukaku — whose second yellow card in the first leg of the Coppa Italia semi-final, shown amid deplorable racist chanting as he celebrated scoring an equalising penalty in Turin — was insensitively upheld. Aware of the optics, Gravina compassionately and sensationally overruled his own prosecutors.
These are the disorienting shifting sands of Italian football. No one knows where anyone stands. No one apart from Mourinho: “We’re in Italy.”
