Italy

The shameful specter of racist abuse in Italian football reappeared on May 6 after Torino’s match against Juventus. Not a week after the footballing authorities abandoned their duty of care regarding Sulley Muntari, Medhi Benatia noticed racist comments being made in his ear by a technician during a live, on-air interview following the 1-1 draw. Stopping abruptly, he demanded to know who had referred to him as a “Moroccan piece of sh*t”. 

Italian football has a crisis on its hands and I’m not even sure they realize how serious it is. For the better part of a decade now, with the exception of Juventus, Italy’s Serie A has been in decline. League officials would like to blame the country’s aging stadiums or the lack of a lucrative television deal - and those are valid points - but the real issue is much more serious. 

Italy does not have a football problem. Italy has a race problem. 

Despite calls from AS Roma coach Luciano Spalletti and fellow professionals to have the club extend Francesco Totti’s contract another year, new Roma sporting director Monchi has confirmed that plans for this to be Totti’s last season had been put in place before he was appointed on April 24.

For the last five years, every battle between Lazio and Roma has had the same repeated sub-plot: could this be the last Derby della Capitale for Francesco Totti? Eventually, this will be true. Eventually, there will be a time when Rome’s favourite son will no longer be able to enter the fray. Already, he has been relegated to a bit part player in the derby. But, as ever with Totti, he has managed to make starting from the subs’ bench a vital part of the action.

Sulley Muntari, whose exceptional professional career has seen him play extensively for Udinese, Inter and AC Milan, was booked for reporting racial abuse from the stands and subsequently walked off the pitch in protest in Cagliari. 

Sulley Muntari walks off pitch at Cagliari (playing for Pescara, Sunday) after yellow crd for reporting racist abusepic.twitter.com/tTtZLUQ7Ip

Paris, London, Madrid, Rome, Venice — all are world renowned cities, but one is not like the others. 

Every major European city is also represented by an internationally famous soccer club too; that is, every city except Venice, Italy. 

But that might soon change. Just last week, Venezia FC secured promotion to Serie B, Italy’s second division. That may not sound like much, but given the club’s history, combined with its newfound ambition and financial backing, Italians are now paying attention to the team from the Venetian Lagoon.

Nine goals. Nine. Four goals for Inter, five for Fiorentina. I think it’s fair to say that no one expected that. Elsewhere, Juventus demolished Genoa with four goals and no reply. Expected. Lazio rumbled right over Palermo, going five-nil up in thirty minutes and finishing the game six to one. Expected. Napoli drew two apiece away at Sassuolo. Not that expected, to be honest, but not that shocking. But Fiorentina five, Inter four? That’s a result that makes you sit up and take notice.

As FC Barcelona discovered last Wednesday, one does not simply mess with the Juventus defense. On Sunday, Juve hosted lowly Genoa at Juventus Stadium with the opportunity to stretch their lead at the top of Serie A to 11 points before Monday’s meeting between Roma and Pescara.

Deadlines are interesting things. For Milan in recent weeks – in recent years, really – a flurry of deadlines have been dodged, avoided, missed, and ignored. In the past seven days, however, everything seems have slotted into place. The impending deadline for the sale of one of the world’s most storied clubs to a shady Chinese investment firm was finally completed, ending the ownership of a shadiest of shady owners himself, Silvio Berlusconi.

At last, Yonghong Li’s Rossoneri Sport Investment Lux has completed the purchase of AC Milan from Silvio Berlusconi’s Fininvest. The deal values AC Milan at 740 million euros, which includes the club’s debt of 220 million.