Thursday 30 July, 2009
Blog: Calcio in crisis
With so many clubs going to the wall in Italy Charles Ducksbury believes it is time that the Lega Calcio took action
Messina, Treviso, Venezia and Como may not be the household names in world football, but all have something in common. All have experienced the glitz and glamour of Serie A in the last few years, but more importantly all have ceased to be and had to re-form in the underworld of Serie D and beyond due to financial difficulties.
On top of these sides, Sambenedettese, Avellino, Pisa, and Pistoise have disappeared from C1, and Ivrea and Biellese from C2 just this year. Add Spezia, Martina, CastelNuovo, Teramo, Lucchese, Massese, Nuorese and Torres from last year, and that's 18 professional teams that have vanished from the ranks in the last 2 years.
However, the reason for this happening is different for the bigger and smaller clubs. The main reason for the smaller clubs is the problem regarding attendances. Compared to the equivalent League in England, Italy trails far behind. Not a single club in England had a League attendance below 1,000 last season, yet in Italy many clubs at C2 level couldn't average over that same number over a season.
This is not a criticism of Italy or it's clubs, however when clubs average the small amounts they do, why is money spent on transfers and paying higher wages when that money should be spent on keeping the club running? The high number of clubs going bust must surely tell the Lega Calcio that sanctions on wages in comparison to revenue need to be put in place, otherwise more clubs will be lost in the future.
In contrast, bigger clubs are going into meltdown because it's too easy to re-form under a different banner and progress back up through the Leagues. Clubs like Messina and Pisa are too big to be playing in the lower Leagues for too long, so they spend large amounts while in B "chasing the dream" with no real deterrent. If they go bust, they'll just re-start and be back where they started in 4 or 5 years.
However, fan pressure does mean Presidents over-spend trying to move their projects ahead of schedule, causing a huge deficit between incomings and outgoings. Again, the Lega Calcio needs to be harder on these clubs, perhaps sending them all the way to the bottom of the ladder, rather than just to Serie D. That way, rather than taking a couple of years to climb back, it would take teams 8 or 9 years, assuming they win promotion every season.
The time has arrived for the authorities to sit up and do something quick, because Italy is losing many clubs, and while some such as Como and Messina will re-appear in time, is it so un-realistic to think that Torres or Teramo will never re-surface?
football-italia.net
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Really sad issue you hardly hear about when you're not checking italian sources all the time. I was really shocked by Pisa going down. I feel sad for Treviso also because I was in this cute little town and walked on the pitch in February. There was still Serie B football being played at that time. Messina and Venezia had spells in Serie A not long ago. They will be missed.
I would appreciate a blog for the lower Italian leagues. I don't know whether there is interest or not, but at least Serie B should be relevant for us Juventini. We know how it looks like down there.