How Do We Love Thee, Tuttosport? Let Us Count the Ways.

By: Martha | April 6th, 2007

Casual Luca. Turin-based newspaper Tuttosport is a goldmine of often bizarre, usually Juve-related stories, and it provides hours of entertainment on slow news days. (Imagine how great it would be if their website wasn’t flash-based, and we could unleash the magic of Google translate upon them!) While there’s nothing earth-shattering in the paper today, there are a couple of tasty, vaguely plausible rumors for our reading pleasure.

First of all, the paper seems to be suffering from a bit of schizophrenia when it comes to the destination of Reggina striker Rolando Bianchi. Early this week, they reported that Juve were pursuing the player, and might be able to lock him up by including their half-ownership of young Bulgarian wizard Valeri Bojinov in the deal. Just a day later, however, it was as if they forgot that entire story — they proudly revealed that Fiorentina (who have been chasing Bianchi for a while) were the ones closing in on a deal, and that they, too, were dangling the carrot of Bojinov (Fiorentina and Juve share ownership of the player). Of course, what will probably happen is that Milan will swoop in and steal Bianchi from everyone — that’ll be in Tuttosport tomorrow.

Moving on to bigger and better things, the paper’s front page today announces that Juve have put in their bid for Luca Toni: They’ll pay £10 million and throw in the rights to Manuele Blasi, who is currently with Fiorentina on loan. As for Toni, he’d allegedly get £2.7 million/year, an amount Fiorentina have already said they have no intention of paying. If there’s any truth to this, it will probably tempt both Toni and the Viola — money and a regular, first-team spot for the striker, money and the services of a player who has been a big part of their success this year for his club. What’s not to like? (Of course, if you believe what Toni’s agent supposedly told RAI Sport, he’s all but signed for Inter. So, as usual, no one knows a damn thing.)