News Roundup as Milan Try Frantically to Find Michael Jordan’s Number

By: Martha | November 19th, 2007

How sweet. I’m traveling Tuesday morning; will get back to the grindstone as soon as is humanly possible.

•Kaka’s dreams: 1)To captain Brazil; 2)To meet Michael Jordan; 3)To win the Golden Ball. Not necessarily in that order.

•Atalanta have suspended striker Riccardo Zampagna from the team “for an offensive attitude towards the coach.” There’s no word on how long he’ll be out — could this be a chance, perhaps, for Simone Inzaghi to do more than warm up?

•In other Atalanta news, it should come to no surprise to anyone that they’ve accept the closure of the Curva Nord through March, and that neither they nor Milan are protesting the decision to replay their abandoned match behind closed doors.

•Roberto Donadoni lurves his current Azzurri side, and plans to take them to the Euros with him. Most of them, anyway — there’s always room for, say, a Del Piero or a Cassano, should their play be deserving.

•A WAG speaks: Alena Seredova, Gigi Buffon’s agreeable, pregnant, spectacularly hot fiancée has informed the media that, had her man left Juventus in the wake of the team’s demotion two summers ago, he’d have joined Milan, not Inter. Whew. Glad that’s settled.

•After lengthy negotiations, the control of TV rights for football have finally been sorted out in Italy and, starting in 2010, they’ll be sold by the league for the clubs rather than negotiated separately by each club, an arrangements that has led to wildly different prices (no prizes for guessing which clubs earn the most). Under the new policy, 40% of the profits will be split evenly among the clubs, with the rest alloted based on things like table standing and the size of each club’s support base.

•The nominations are out for the Oscars, the very oddly named player-voted awards that are given out each winter based on the previous season in Serie A. Yes, that’s right: Serie A. Which means no Gigi Buffon! If Sebastian Frey doesn’t get best goalkeeper this year, it ain’t never gonna happen.

•Ronaldo’s suddenly full head of hair? Magic!