Nazionale News

By: Francesco | May 7th, 2008

Gattuso has competition for a starting spot in midfield.

Cassano and Del Piero can still hope for call-ups to Euro 2008. Why? Because players going to Euro 2008 need an anti-tick vaccine (haven’t they ever heard of bug spray?), so the FIGC has contacted the clubs of 48 players that Donadoni has on his possible selection list and has told them to administer the vaccine to these players. The article doesn’t give the full list (if anyone can find this list they will get some kind of grand recognition, because I’ve been searching all day), but it does mention some names. You can forget about the third keeper being Torino’s Matteo Sereni, as he is not on the list. Morgan De Sanctis and Christian Abbiati are on the list, so it looks like one of those two will be the 3rd keeper. There are even some surprising names, like Aimo Diana and David Di Michele of Torino, Marco Marchionni of Juventus, and Dario Dainelli and Manuel Pasqual of Fiorentina. Which brings us to the striker news- Antonio Cassano, Alessandro Del Piero, and Pippo Inzaghi are all on the list, so it means Donadoni hasn’t forgotten about those three. Also on the list is Alessandro Nesta, but that must be some kind of typo or Nesta may just want the vaccine anyway to protect himself from ticks this summer.

Next is news about Donadoni’s contract saga. For the past few months we’ve all heard the stories of Donadoni refusing an extension, meeting with President Abete, whining about the contract, etc. Abete had originally offered Donadoni a 2 year contract, however with a clause included that stated Donadoni could be fired if he did not reach the semi-final. Donadoni continued to refuse the contract, saying he did not want a contract with clauses. But now it seems that Donadoni is ready to accept that same contract. Why the change of heart? The answer is money. The FIGChave offered the same contract to Donadoni, a 2 year extension which would take him to June 2010, with his salary increasing from 1.4 million a year to 2 million a year. The semi-final clause is still in there, but now if the FIGC decided to axe Donadoni for not reaching the final four, they will have to pay him 1 million euro. So Donadoni at least wants some compensation money if he gets fired. What if he goes out in the group stage? Do they still have to pay 1 million euro? There should be some kind of pay scale. Group Stage Exit- he gets paid 1 euro. Quarter-Final exit- he gets paid 100 euro. Semi-final exit- 1,000 euro. Final exit- 100,000 euro.