More on This “ZOMG INTER ARE GOING DOWN!” Thing
By: Martha | June 21st, 2007
First, the basic facts: Inter have been added to the list of clubs being investigated for financial irregularities over the past few years. What does this mean? Well, at the close of every season, each club is required to present their books to COVISOC (the financial branch of FIGC), and convince that body of two things, first that their finances are in order, and second that they’ve got the funds available to cover the upcoming season’s expenses. If they can’t, in theory, they’re not allowed to participate in the upcoming season; if my memory is correct, while relegation is often threatened it’s rarely enforced, but clubs can be punished in other ways (kept out of international tournaments, for example).
In order to make their books look more stable than they are, it’s fairly common for teams to sell low-level players to one another for giant fees, with the other team making up the losses later by selling the players back and getting the income on their own books for the next season.* Common though it is, however, this practice is also illegal, and Milan and Inter were hit with very specific charges in this area earlier this year, regarding the frequent exchanges of goalkeeper Simone Brunelli (among others) between 2002 and 2003.
The current investigations seem to have grown out of that earlier case and now extend through the 2005-2006 season. Shockingly, they involve not just Inter (though, as has been pointed out in the comments, you’d never know it from reading the headlines of this story around the world), but also Sampdoria, Reggina, Milan, Roma, and former Lazio boss Sergio Cragnotti. Now, obviously Inter are in the headlines because they somehow managed to escape Calciopoli not only smugly unscathed, but also with an extra Scudetto, so people are getting a kick out of seeing them sullied by these charges. Plus, it’s been declared “possible” that Inter could both lose that asterisked 2005-2006 title and also, theoretically, be sent down depending on the results of the current investigation. Under those circumstances, it’s hard to blame people for focusing on Inter above the other implicated clubs.
But. Will Inter (or Roma, or Milan, or Samp, or Reggina, or Lazio) go down? No freaking way. Will they suffer some sort of punishment, be it a fine or, possibly, points deduction? Maybe. But proving intentional mis-valuing of players is a lot more difficult that proving, with the aid of wiretaps, that matches have been fixed, or referees persuaded to be “friendly” to certain clubs. As the already on-message Massimo Moratti said yesterday, “the worth of players in this market is difficult to understand. A player that is worth five today could be worth 12 within a month, and then maybe nothing.” Hate Inter or not, how can you argue with that? The guy may be full of crap, but what he says is true.
If nothing else comes out, I’m guessing a medium-sized fine, and nothing more.
*My info here comes from John Foot’s phenomenal Calcio, which everyone should read. I’m currently across the ocean from my copy and am therefore unable to create proper footnotes, but I swear I’m not making this up.
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Comments
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I’ve been meaning to get a copy of that book for awhile now. I should pick one up and read it after the bar exam next month.
I really wish that Italian Football would get it together. It just seems like so many things go on behind closed doors and there has been a culture of permissiveness for so long that has allowed this to happen. These constant stories every summer about various shady dealings, whether financial or with whatever you would describe the caliciopoli scandal, are getting old. They are a blight on the game and need to be fixed. This doesn’t even touch the stadium security issues.
Forgive my ignorance, but is there a commissioner of Italian football? It seems to be that these clubs are allowed to operate with too much autonomy and there are only periodic checks on their books and the like to make sure things are on the up and up. And these books are clearly very easy to fudge.
I’d like to see someone come in and be more involved in an admisitrative role over the entire league. This could help the percieved mistreatment of the smaller clubs and make sure there are not these constant stories of various wrongdoings. Plus, they could help with the stadium infrastructure improvements. Of course, this is too logical so it would probably never happen.
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United States
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I like how that photo with that ad makes it look like Inter is under pressure from Benetton.
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United States -
oh my god…this is something illegeal that my beloved juventus have yet to be part of!!! This is a proud day for me because i can say this is one thing stupid Moggi didnt to to us:)
Posted from
Canada -
Couple things, TMC.
First, calcio is weird, isn’t it? On the surface, there’s this great glamour to it, but once you peek underneath it’s just a complete and utter disaster. And yet, once you get emotionally involved, it’s almost impossible to extricate yourself. In some weird way, the patheticness of it makes me like it even more — it’s as if calcio is helpless before its own corruption, and no one realized they’re the only people who can fix it.
Second, I don’t *think* there’s a comish, but there’s a president of FIGC (Which, according to Wikipedia, is in administration. Jesus Christ.) who, if I’m not mistaken, is elected by the club presidents (?), ala American football. I’m sure someone will correct me if I’m spectacularly wrong.
Third, I really think you’ll love Foot’s book, particularly with your already solid knowledge of the sport. It’s a great general history, but almost does a nice job of covering the modern sport, as well as presenting crazy anecdotes that make it much more intimate than your typically cold, distant history.
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Portugal -
I guess I got to order that Calcio book. Sounds very interesting and a bit frightening.
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Germany -
A question for Martha: I have Paddy Agnew’s Forza Italia instead of John Foot’s Calcio. Have you read Agnew’s? And if so, how does it compare to Foot’s book?
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Australia -
Linda, the two books are very different. I loved Agnew’s, as well, but found it more a broad-brush, cultural history of Italy into which football was folded. Foot’s books is an enormous, wide-ranging history of football and football alone; his vision is very focused on the game, so in Calcio the cultural history is more incidental than anything else. It’s unwieldy, sometimes, and the writing isn’t as good as Agnew’s (you get the impression parts were written as articles, though I don’t know if that’s true) but the overall effect is really fantastic. Definitely worth reading both.
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Portugal -
Thanks for the info! Will definitely have to track the Foot book down.
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Australia -
[...] in June, there was a frenzy about investigations into sketchy transfers among Serie A clubs, leading to speculation that it was Calciopoli 2.0, and [...]
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