Re: Serie A Thread - 2010/11 Season
wellcome on board mate.
after splashing dozens of millions for years (despite the lack of matching incomes) and building an amazing squad (batistuta, rui costa, baiano, toldo, chiesa, morfeo, mijatovic, torricelli, flachi, padalino and many more i don't remember right now),
Vittorio Cecchi Gori (former
fiorentina owner) had to face the consequences of his years of crazy spending. fiorentina faced bankrupt. all the players were gone, the club was dumped in serie c (italian third division). fiorentina was even deprived of his name; infact the new owners (the Della Valle family) had to found a new company, with a new name (florentia viola), as fiorentina was officially dead. So Firenze's club was stripped of his name, of his history... even of his trophies.
and only 1 year after the fiorentina's death, the della valle family were eventually able to buy back the old name "fiorentina" and also the history (and trophies) of the old dead club.
the della valle family had to start over from serie c..... climbing the ranks of italian football, through serie b and finally serie a. they rebuilt the club on solid foundations, as today fiorentina has no debts at all and makes profits each and every season.
parma and lazio fans were more lucky (so to speak) than fiorentina fans. Callisto Tanzi (former parma owner) and Sergio Cragnotti did the exact same mistake Cecchi Gori did in firenze: overspending and thinking international glory was more important than financial stability.......
Callisto Tanzi turned
Parma into one of the greatests teams in europe, a team which won 2 uefa cups in 4 years and which became a title contender in serie a.... a young (but already world class) gigi buffon, fabio cannavaro and thuram (arguably the best cb partnership in the world those days)...veron, couto, dino baggio, conceicao, almeyda and nakata at midfield....Stoichkov, crespo, inzaghi, zola in attack.... some of the greatest players in the world have played in parma, during the Tanzi era (from '96 to 2004).... but also Tanzi overreached himself and spent more than he could.
and the only reason why parma didn't face the same tragic end fiorentina had to deal with... is because the club was saved by a very tricky financial move (allowed by a recently approved law: the legge marzano). yet, even though parma managed to avoid the loss of his name and history..... even though they didn't have to start over from serie c, the new owner still had to payout parma's debts... and it took them years to get back on track.
as for
lazio, we all know the glorious all star team
Cragnotti (lazio owner from '98 to 2003) built. marcheggiani, mjhailovic, nesta, nedved, stankovic, salas, mancini, boksic, vieri, sensini, simeone, claudio lopez, peruzzi, stam, liverani, fiore.
cragnotti spared no expenses, and even though the club had great incomes, he spent so much money to put the club in debt..... just to give u an idea, he bought mendieta from valencia for 89 miliardi of liras!!! that's the equivalent of 47 millions euros!!!! and we're talking about 2001!!! (the equivalent of those 47 million euros in today's economy would probably be 80 millions euros)..... mendieta turned out to be a huge flop, so what did Cragnotti do? after 1 single season, he sent him back in spain... in barcelona..... ON A FREE LOAN!... that means a capital loss of 47 millions euros in 1 single year!
Cragnotti made lazio the best team in europe (by far) but he also brought the club on the brink of disaster..... lazio was saved from certain bankrupcy by their current owner (claudio lotito)..... Lotito saved lazio from the same consequences fiorentina faced...... but we're in 2010... 6 years after the end of cragnotti's era...... and lotito is still paying cragnotti's debts!
so u can clearely see why today most italian club presidents and owners value financial stability much more than european glory. if europa league would be worth (at least) half as much as champions league, then they would certainly take europa league in big consideration....... but not at theese conditions.
gerd said:
I agree with most point in your posts Ben.
But i don't think the EL is to blame. It's the CL that is to blame.
The Cl is a bastard or an half-harted solution.
Either you have a CL with only the champions of each country and without group stages but with immediate elimination, or else you really make a league with the best European clubs. Then people will be allowed to see the best clubs week in week out. But i'm against this second solution. It will kill football at gras roots level and fantastic clubs like Palermo, Lille, Sevilla, Ajax and others will disappear...in the long term this will be the end of football.
yeah i completely agree with u. actually i don't even think the CL is to blame.... i mean there's a reason if champions league has this current format.... and it's the same reason why europa league has this current format...... and also the same reason why serie a (aswell as liga and epl) have a 20 clubs format.... actually it's not 1 reason, there are 2 reasons: common consent and money.
i also understand why platini decided for this new formula change in both CL and europa league. When Platini decided to try and run for uefa presidency, he knew Johansson already had the approval of the top european leagues (epl, liga, serie a).... so he had to create a political platform that could win the concensus of minor leagues.
and that's how he won the elections; thanks to the vote of minor leagues. now he's ovbiously trying to keep his promises (like any good politician would do).
there are lots of people (especially in england it seems) who think platini has some sort of a hidden agenda or his a "hater".... this is obviously ridiculous.
there's no hidden agenda at all.... everyone knew his political platform.... and he doesn't "hate" england or italy......he's a grown man, not a childish fanboy..... he's just making the best interests of those who voted for him...... italy didn't vote for platini, neither england.... so why should he value Palermo's needs more than, say, Gent's needs.
it's always just a matter of perspectives. if u would ask an italian, he would probably tell u platini is doing a bad job.... that champions league and europa league should have no group stages at all... that those competitions should have less teams and a lighter schedule.....
... but if u ask a debreceni fan or a belgian fan or a romanian fan, he would probably tell u platini is doing an amazing job.
what's best for top clubs like barca, inter and chelsea, might not be good for midclass clubs like palermo...... and what's best for palermo may not be good for very small clubs in minor leagues like Gent....
there's no way of making us all happy, so i'm not gonna complain about platini's job..... i'm not gonna say i want him to change europa league, just to fullfill my club's needs.....
BUT on the other side no one can force palermo to commit itself to a competition that palermo doesn't like, and no one can judge us for not giving our best in a cup that wasn't conceived for us in the first place.
in the end, platini himself could turn this argument around and tell me "
hey ben what do u want from me?! why don't u ask the italian federation why on earth they decided to add 2 more clubs to serie a??? i mean u guys turn serie a into a 20 clubs league, and then i'm the one who is making your schedule too busy?!? please give me a break"
and if he would reply my like this, i couldn't really deny any of his points. infact not only the europa league and champions league is badly conceived, but also our domestic leagues.....all the top ones except bundi
rfu said:
no, i saw it, but i can't read all that, hurts my eyes.
LOL fair enough
i wish i could be more concise in english.
i mean, i could rewrite this post in spanish or french or italian... and it would come out less than half as long as it did in english... oh well
rfu said:
c'mon man, he aint that bad. He did well enough in euro 2008 i seem to remember. I reckon he's about as good if not better than Sparta's starting CBs
he did great in euro 2008 (along with his partner tamas)..... infact i was delighted when i heard palermo was about to sign him.... "what a high quality backup we got ourselves!" i thought. i don't know what happened later, but believe me, the player u admired in euro 2008 was a completely different cb from the current goian. i can't even begin to tell u how much of a liability he is.
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btw impressive display by napoli yesterday... they pretty much outplayed us... i'v never seen palermo going through so much trouble this season... that was probably our worst seasonal performance (along with the inter match), but it was clearely napoli's merit if we couldn't play our football. hats off! and anyway, we're going to rape them in palermo!
c'mon man, he aint that bad. He did well enough in euro 2008 i seem to remember. I reckon he's about as good if not better than Sparta's starting CBs 
