One of the areas about which Tom claimed I would blog when he introduced me was European football. I am going to keep those to a minimum, since it is a fairly esoteric topic, but the latest events in Italy's professional leagues, which have always had a reputation for corruption, warrant a brief mention.

Like most European leagues, Italy features a system of promotion and relegation, by which teams move up and down between divisions based on their success or failure the previous year. There is lots of money to be made at the top - and much less at the bottom - so winning promotion or avoiding relegation is a huge issue. This offseason, several Serie B (second division) teams successfully went to court and blocked their relegations, compelling the league to expand from 20 to 24. A short version of the affair:

Here's what happened: on April 12 Catania had drawn a home match against Siena in which visiting team defender Martinelli had played. Martinelli had been suspended for a game two weeks before, so Siena had left him home for their following match but he had played in a reserve game and according to Italian FIGC rules (since modified) this did not amount to serving the ban, so he was ineligible to play against Catania.

Catania got their three points from a FIGC court on May 12 but the ruling was overturned a few days later so they went outside the football courts to seek justice, and in a stomach-turning succession of court decisions were promoted back and sent back down at least four times, with a circus act of judges, lawyers, politicians and other assorted types trying to put their foot in the door and grab their 15 minutes of fame.

This led to a series of other teams seeking relief in civil courts, leading the Italian socer authorities to expand the division to accommodate these teams without relegating any others. Now the rest of the teams are planning a boycott.

America is both sports crazy and famously litigious, but this is one phenomenon we have thus far luckily avoided. Although I suppose it is now only a question of time . . .

N.B.: Anyone interested in Italian football, and the passion and folly it inspires, should read Joe McGinnis' wonderful book The Miracle of Castel di Sangro, an amusing and heartbreaking account of a season spent with an overachieving team in Serie B.
- posted by Anonymous @ 2:41 PM