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Juve still paying for match-fixing

(China Daily)
Updated: 2011-05-25 07:51

ROME - It is five years since Juventus was found guilty of match-fixing for its part in the Italian Calciopoli scandal and having finished the 2010/11 season in seventh, it seems it is still paying for it.

Juve drew 2-2 against Napoli on Sunday as Roma beat Sampdoria 3-1 to ensure the Old Lady of Turin not only finished seventh for the second year in a row but has missed out on European soccer for the third year in the past six.

Having been relegated to Serie B for its part in Calciopoli - and stripped of both the 2005 and 2006 titles - it missed out on Europe that season and the next, following its return to Serie A.

But in its first season back in the top flight, Juve surprised many people by claiming a third-placed finish.

Having had to sell stars such as Zlatan Ibrahimovic, Patrick Vieira and Fabio Cannavaro when it dropped into Serie B, it was expected to need some time to regroup.

But its second season back in the top flight saw it finish second and many were predicting a Juve title the next season - among them the then Italy coach Marcello Lippi.

But what happened instead was the Turin giant has taken one step back after another, its return to the upper echelons of the table proving merely a false dawn.

And with a second disastrous season in a row now completed, it has decided to part company with coach Luigi Delneri, meaning it is looking for a seventh coach in the space of five years.

Fabio Capello walked out with the club relegated to Serie B, to join Real Madrid, and Didier Deschamps did likewise after guiding it to promotion back to the top flight, claiming it wasn't supporting him enough.

Juve finally seemed to have found some stability with Claudio Ranieri, who was at the helm for its first two seasons back in Serie A.

However, he was inexplicably fired two games before the end of the 2008-09 season because the club was afraid it would miss out on a top-three finish and direct qualification for the Champions League group stages. Such a scenario seems laughable now with the club failing even to make it into the Europa League.

As it happened, it won its last two games under Ciro Ferrara and finished second.

But that was the end of the progress the club had been making.

Cannavaro returned to the club the next season but under Ferrara Juve started to stutter, badly, and was particularly vulnerable in defense.

Things didn't improve when he was fired just past the mid-season point and Alberto Zaccheroni took over until the end of the season, which it finished with record numbers of defeats and goals conceded.

Agence France-Presse

(China Daily 05/25/2011 page23)