Moggi, you should have tried Skype!

When I was child, my grand-father took me for the first time to the San Siro Stadium. It was 1979 and I had the chance to watch one of the last Soccer games during a season when Inter won the Scudetto. The opponents were Inter and Pescara and my favorite team won 2 by 0. Inter's coach was Eugenio Bersellini, who became during his career the Football coach of the Libian national team.
I was in the second grade Elementary School.

At that time, the main argument for discussion with my classmates was about Juventus and its "cheating" style. As background for non Italian reader, the Agnelli family owned not only Fiat, the Italian automaker, but also Juventus (by the way, now Juventus is listed in the Italian stock exchange, but it is still partly owned by Fiat). Once upon the time, there was rumors, many rumors, that referees got cars in exchange for favourable "treatments" during soccer games. Rumors, only rumors.

Wikipedia defines cheating as the act "employed to create an unfair advantage, usually in one's own interest, and often at the expense of others." I was too young to define the meaning of "cheating", Internet was not commonly available. In the last few days, after 25 years, I got an impressive example of what cheating signifies. Juventus, or some Juventus managers have adopted very "unconventional" behaviour to favor their team during the last year season.
A great comment about this story is on the Economist website, where the Magazine talks about (a new) Italian Scandal, now called "The Dirty feet".

The main character of this scandal is by far the General Manager of Juventus Soccer team, Mr. Moggi. Moggi has always been considered one of the most controversial soccer manager of the last twenty years, earning the nickname of "Lucky Luciano". In the past, he was also called Mr. Bat («Paletta») since he has been a stationmaster for 19 years, before moving to the Soccer world.

There are so many people talking about him in the last few days, that it is hard for me to say something different and creative. However, the true key (and funny) question of this story has been suggested during one of the last soccer games: why Mr. Moggi had not tried Skype, see below (Source Antijuve website).
My answer is crystal clear: had Mr. Moggi worked for some technology or Telecom companies in Italy, he would have used Skype, avoided wire-tapping and Juventus supporter would have been happy with their 29th title («Scudetto»).

Totti and the Soccer World Cup

Everybody here in Italy is really upset about the serious injury that could block Francesco Totti, the Italian Soccer star, playing for Italy at the 2006 Soccer World Cup.
The Roma playmaker got a tackle from behind by Richard Vanigli and twisted his ankle during a game with Empoli.

Initial assessments said the player would not see action again for two or three months.
I am positive that our capitan will recover from that injury and he will be ready for the game, but I am really questioning why Italian referees do not punish with harsh punishements (i.e. red cards) these kind of behaviours.

Lost in translation

I am just wondering whether Mr. Blatter is planning to introduce new technology into the International soccer. What he said was not clear to everybody. Mr Ian Christon, Football League representative, said at BBC "His comments were misrepresented". Did he say it because of this image? A second question is: should the Fantasy soccer players be rewarded for this "missing goal"?

Litmanen and his fax

Italian sport press has declared that in January 2005, Livorno football club can enroll the Finnish soccer star Jari Litmanen, 33 years old.

Litmanen played with Ajax Amsterdam, Barcelona, Liverpool and now is playing with Helsinki. Gazzetta claims that Jari has sent to Livorno a fax with his money requests. The team reached the Serie A for the first time since the 60's, has limited budget but is eager to hire this soccer phenomenon. I am sure that Livorno fans will be delighted to see Jari in January. Hopefully he is not injured, as it could be. Mister Yahoo is also waiting for you, Jari....

Campioni, il sogno (Champions, the dream)

I am watching a new reality show about Soccer. Ciccio Graziani (World Cup winner in 1982) is the coach.

It is a great game. I am amazed to notice that many Campioni players have their own fans club.

The most popular players are Giuffrida (92 enrollments, with also a second fans club (31) and a third fans club (5)), Alfieri (159) and Francesco Gullo (110), who pretended to have played with FC Basel in Switzerland and in Champions League in 2002 (a funny website explaining what was going on is Francesco Gullo at Basilea, Basel FC!!!), Apicerni (117 enrollments) and Maradona jr.

Other players are: D'Innocenzo, the goalie (76), Emanuele Morelli (58), Claudio Moschino, the most talented player at Campioni (34), Fabio Borriello (108) who has a brother playing in Serie A, Spagnoli (53), who is credited to be one of the three winners, Christian Arrieta (55), a newcomer who arrived to improve the quality of the defence team and is pretty popular (see also Christian's new website, Fabio Maffini (82), Matteo Domeniconi (21), Ciro Olivieri (80), who is now injuried and not available anymore until the end of the soccer season, Gualtieri, the "Cobra" (29), Zoran Ljubisic (5) and Marco Pepe (10). Two Brasilians are also in the team: Mario Bordignon, (3) who already played in the third division in Portugal and the ever-injured Jefferson (5).

I am just wondering why Matteo Bondi has no fans club. Do you have the answer?

Serie A

Juve and A.S. Rome won today in the first round of the Italian soccer Championship (Serie A). Serie A is just started, that's not too bad and it was more or less clear.

What it was less clear is that now for the first time, RossoAlice is offering the Internet broadcast of 10 Italian matches per week for 4euro/month. It is amazing how low is the price for a great service.