Analysis of information sources in references of the Wikipedia article "Andrea Agnelli" in English language version.
'I thought it appropriate to take a step back, to avoid thinking that the choices and decisions that will be made from here on out are, even if only in part, conditioned by my personal involvement,' concluded Agnelli.
... Sergio Santoro, former president of the federal court of the FIGC and member of the Italian Council of State — perhaps the most prominent person to talk about the case. He says 'I find it unusual that the president of the court that handed down the sentence in January 2023 is the same one who, in May 2022, issued the sentence of acquittal in the same trial. ... We don't know if the court has decided to sanction Juventus and its directors for the capital gains affair. If this were the case, it would be a decision in contrast with the precedents of intra-federal justice in matters of capital gains. We need to understand the reasons for this sudden change in jurisprudence. Furthermore, if the penalty imposed is a consequence of capital gains violations, it is unclear how this violation could have been committed by a single company. The capital gain is realized by at least two subjects, while in the case in question no other companies appear to have been punished for this offence.'
We are in March 2020, in full COVID-19 emergency. The league is at a standstill, there is uncertainty about the future, we don't even know if we will return to play, if we will do it with full or empty stadiums. We are in what (as shown by some intercepted documents) Juventus defines the 'worst-worst' scenario, or rather 'players' salaries paid regularly + suspended competitions' with inevitable 'negative repercussions on current and future financial year'. No income (from stadium, merchandising) and full expenses: a disaster. The doubt then is: what to do with salaries, since you don't play? Juve writes in an intercepted email: 'We know that the various national legislations would allow the adoption of wage suspension measures in the event of impossibility in the context of an employment relationship, but the activation of these clauses would certainly lead to disputes if applied spot and not regulated at the system level. In fact, in the absence of agreements or regulations, the clubs would risk having to set up provisions for risks and have repercussions on the patrimonial front (asset value).'
But wasn't it said 'free everyone' and 'do as you like', given the Covid emergency? You are referring to press release no. 49 dated 6 April of Lega Serie A which indicated the guidelines for clubs to deal with the Covid situation and the resulting uncertainty. And indeed the framework agreement of Lega, in line with the actions aimed at reducing the cost of labour adopted at national and international level, foresaw for clubs to pay 4 months' salary less to players in the event of non-resumption of the championship and to pay 2 less month's salary in case of resumption of the championship and effective conclusion of the 2019/20 season. ... Yes, but – says the press release – this resolution was unanimously approved by all the clubs 'except Juventus', which had already organized its own business. The official press release from Juventus announcing the waiver of 4 months' salary (as well as the Agnelli–Chiellini agreement) was dated 28 March 2020 and that was authentic. ... For the prosecutor's office ... [Juventus] seized the opportunity to carry out [their] 'criminal action'.
... even Juventus itself at a certain point realized that this system wasn't generating benefits, but costs ('shit'). And it was Juventus itself that began to think: we have to change, these capital gains are causing us more harm than good. Andrea Agnelli used the same expression that I used before him: 'we flooded the car'. And so there was self-criticism as well as a clear change in behaviour.
Let's assume that there are these phone calls in which Juventus says: 'I'm inflating the price of a player', therefore 'confessing': is it false accounting? And how bad is it? In the words of ... lawyer Francesco Andrianopoli ... 'A clarification: Juventus did not engage in a false/fraudulent operation with these capital gains. In the field of financial statements, it is fraud when an entry that does not exist is entered in the financial statements. For example: I sell an asset for €100,000, but I don't actually own that asset. When, on the other hand, items are entered in the balance sheet that have been valued incorrectly, excessively, or in incorrect years, that is not a 'falsehood' but an 'incorrect entry', which is a balance sheet irregularity but not a crime or an offence. What we are talking about, in terms of capital gains, is not 'false' data, because there are two teams that exchange two players and say: 'mine is worth 20, yours is worth 20, let's make this exchange so you make a capital gain and I make a capital gain' whereas the 'real' value (which is impossible to determine for those players) is not 20 but something less. At this point, there is no falsehood: first of all because not the entire value is fictional: perhaps those players, instead of being worth 20 and 20, were worth (if anyone can ascertain it) 10 and 10, but certainly not 0 and 0. Secondly: on their balance sheets, each of the two teams put both the positive entry of +20 and the negative entry of -20. So it is not the situation mentioned above where a non-existent (false) asset is sold and an operation is carried out by introducing only a positive (fraudulent) component to the balance sheet. In addition to the immediate capital gain of 20 million, in subsequent years the team will find their costs increased by 20 million. So there is no positive result on the long-term financial statements; there is the problem that these items end up on different financial statements, but that is very different from saying that they are 'false'.
Case #1 – Genoa, Udinese, Reggina (2008) ... Result? €400,000 fine for the companies. ... Case #2 – Sampdoria (2008) ... Result? Fine of €36,000 for the company. ... Case #3 – AC Milan and Inter (2008) ... Result? €90,000 fine for the companies. ... Case #4 – Chievo and Cesena (2018) ... Result? 3 penalty points for Chievo and 15 for Cesena. ... sentences not final as in the meantime the two companies went bankrupt.
The case involves player contracts, transfers and agent dealings between 2018 and 2020. At the start of the pandemic, Juventus said 23 players agreed to reduce their salary for four months to help the club through the crisis. But prosecutors claim the players gave up only one month's salary.
Juventus have been acquitted, the offending leagues (2004/2005 and 2005/2006) have been declared regular, and the reasons for the conviction of Luciano Moggi are vague; mostly, they condemn his position, that he was in a position to commit a crime. In short, be careful to enter a shop without surveillance because even if you don't steal, you would have had the opportunity. And go on to explain to your friends that you're honest people after the morbid and pro-sales campaign of the newspapers. ... a club has been acquitted, and no one has heard of it, and whoever has heard of it, they don't accept it. The verdict of 2006, made in a hurry, was acceptable, that of Naples was not. The problem then lies not so much in vulgar journalism as in readers who accept the truths that are convenient. Juventus were, rightly or wrongly, the best justification for the failures of others, and it was in popular sentiment, as evidenced by the new controversies concerning 'The System.' But how? Wasn't the rotten erased? The referees since 2006 make mistakes in good faith, the word of Massimo Moratti (the only 'honest'). ... it isn't a question of tifo, but of a critical spirit, of the desire to deepen and not be satisfied with the headlines (as did Oliviero Beha, a well-known Viola [Fiorentina] fan, who, however, drew conclusions outside the chorus because, despite enjoying it as a tifoso, he suffered as a journalist. He wasn't satisfied and went into depth. He was one of the few).
... 'I continue to have a good relationship with President Ceferin and respect him, when you work in the business you need to know what it means to sign an NDA, I think I behaved in the most correct way possible. Ceferin remains a person who has my esteem, godfather of my daughter, time will fix any mistakes and misunderstandings.'
... [Agnelli] hopes that 'the EU Court will recognize the dominant position of UEFA by starting to evaluate football as an industry.' ... 'The differences between gaming and the industry are not understood by the regulators.'
... per la sua visione e la sua capacità imprenditoriale, che gli hanno permesso di sviluppare la Juventus, portandola ad essere una delle prime squadre di calcio al mondo e trasformandola dall'essere una società sportiva tradizionale ad un colosso anche commerciale, con un marchio sapientemente valorizzato, con un Museo [sic] in grado di creare un'esperienza emotiva unica e facendola diventare a tutti gli effetti uno dei principali motori dell'economia turistica della nostra Città [sic].[... for his vision and entrepreneurial skills, which have allowed him to develop Juventus, leading it to be one of the top football teams in the world and transforming it from being a traditional sports club into a colossus also in commercial terms, with a wisely enhanced brand, with a museum capable of creating a unique emotional experience and making it in effect one of the main drivers of the touristic economy of our city.]
Juventus have formally submitted an appeal to the penalty. The 15-point penalty is harsher than the nine-point deduction recommended by an FIGC prosecutor earlier in the day. This all comes after the club's recent financial statements were under scrutiny by prosecutors and Italian market regulator CONSOB in the past months for alleged false accounting and market manipulation. ... The investigation led to the board stepping down in November, which also marked the end of an era for Agnelli and Nedved. The club acknowledged the so-called 'salary maneuvers' from the 2019–20 and 2020–21 fiscal years, adding that 'the complexity of such profiles on valuation elements may be subject to different interpretations.'
After four hours of discussion, in the elegant building on Corso Galileo Ferraris, in the heart of Turin, the moderate line recently promoted by President Cobolli Gigli won. Jean Claude Blanc, the managing director, the man who had advocated confrontation with the [Italian] Football Federation, has taken a step back by adapting to the majority. ... A small group of fans met outside the Juventus headquarters and targeted Cobolli Gigli and Blanc. 'You have ruined a hundred years of history', ... Then the words of coach Deschamps at the end of the Tim trophy at San Siro are striking: 'The players and I have some difficulty understanding, maybe we don't know everything, but we don't understand the reason for the appeal withdrawn. A decision had been made, then it changed, I expect explanations. What is certain is that we will fight all season', said the French coach with a controversial air. ... Indeed, there has been a change. But Federcalcio and Coni have not provided any precise guarantee to Juventus. 'There was no negotiation,' they said from via Allegri. Rossi, however, did not hide his satisfaction with the intention of the lost sheep returned to the fold to participate actively in the renewal and organization of football. Petrucci, on the other hand, thanked John Elkann, who followed the matter personally, and Montezemolo 'for the call to common sense and serenity, fully understood.'
'I believed, and still believe, that European football needs structural reforms to face the future, otherwise we are heading towards an inexorable decline of football in favour of a dominant league, which is the Premier League, which within a few years will attract all the talent of European football in its league', so the outgoing president of Juventus, Andrea Agnelli, speaking at the club's shareholders' meeting, returned to the Super League project. 'It seems clear to me – he concluded – that the current regulators have no desire to address the problems, maintaining their position of privilege.'
The prosecutor of the Prisma investigation in another video also from 2019 says: 'A wish that is absolutely unattainable, like, for example, Juventus winning the Champions League.'
The capital gains theme has been 'talked about' for decades and it is not a lever to which only Juventus have resorted, recently sentenced in the sports process. It is therefore inevitable to ask a question: why have they not been defined in advance of the rules of clear conduct so as to be able, subsequently, to check and punish severely those who do not respect them? ... the previous jurisprudentials highlighting that these behaviors have almost never been punished, not so much because the values of the crossed players had not been inflated, but rather for the difficulty of demonstrating it (not existing something similar to a market value, above all for younger players). We get to the point. Those who follow the investigation will be thinking: 'And no, for Juventus it is different, because being listed they should have applied Par. 45 of IAS 38 and not to register the capital gain!' But this is just a fig leaf. The sporting sentence condemns Juventus for having concealed the exchange nature of the crossed operations in order to avoid the risk of not being able to enroll the capital gain. ... Can you punish for this reason, despite the fact that Juventus have declared that they have never applied this accounting policy in the past (and therefore never declared in public budgets)? Even though this accounting treatment would seem to be applied by very few football clubs in Europe (Consob says at least two)? Despite no control body of the world of football and non-internal and external, has it ever contested the failure to apply to the three (now two) listed companies? But above all, can a company be punished for the failure to apply an accounting policy which, if considered the rule to be applied ... it would concern ... all football teams?
Why only Juventus? And why were they retried on a charge for which the same federal prosecutor's office acquitted them? Basically, how is it possible that they were tried and convicted of a crime (that of capital gains) that did not exist? How is it possible to arrive at an afflictive verdict without even indictment of the persons under investigation? And above all – this is the defensive thesis of the Juventus lawyers – the reasons for the sentence are 'tainted by illogicality and groundlessness'. Questions and statements that mix with feelings of anger and bewilderment that fuel the strong discontent of the community of tifosi. ... The sensation and fear ... fuel the idea that – as happened in 2006 – once again only one company was targeted.
'... [Juventus] were acquitted in the ordinary [justice] proceedings as Moggi himself also acted out of personal interest [to favour Lazio and Fiorentina]. ... .'
Of the 4,627 days spent at the helm of the club, he spent 3,282 as the champion of Italy (71%). ... The trophies in all are 19 ... and make him the most titled president in the club's history.
The Calciopoli scandal in 2006 resulted in the Bianconeri being relegated from Serie A and stripped of two league titles, with the club and former general manager Luciano Moggi accused of having an exclusive relationship with referee designators. However, civil and criminal trials have since determined that Juventus and Moggi did not enjoy such an advantage and that the punishments handed out in 2006 were based on incomplete evidence, and Moggi's prison sentence was also written off last week following his appeal at the Court of Cassation. As a result of the subsequent findings, Juventus have filed a lawsuit against the FIGC and are claiming €443m for lost revenue and damage to their reputation.
The Turin Public Prosecutor announced the completion of the 'Prisma' in October and then, on November 28, the entire board of directors resigned ahead of an extraordinary general assembly. It's important to stress that there was no admission of guilt. The club merely stated that it was 'considered to be in the best social interest to recommend that Juventus equip itself with a new board of directors to address these issues'. In a statement sent to all members of staff, outgoing president Agnelli wrote: 'When the team is not united, then that opens the way for opponents to hurt you and that can be fatal. In that moment, you must have the sharpness of mind to contain the damage: we are facing a delicate moment as a club and that unity is lost. 'Better to leave all together giving the opportunity for a new team to overturn that game.'
President Agnelli wins the Golden Foot Prestige. ... In addition, in 2020 the Golden Foot Prestige Award was also awarded for the first time, a recognition dedicated to a president who is still active: the prize, awarded by the Golden Foot Commission after a survey among the international press, went to Andrea Agnelli for the 17 trophies won in 10 years of presidency of Juventus.
As the Gazzetta dello Sport has previously outlined, the practice of plusvalenza is undeniably of colossal importance in Italy. In 2018–19, the last season before Covid-19 hit, 20 Serie A clubs made a total of €699m in capital gains – more than any of the other 'Big Five' leagues. ... The difference is that while this affair does involve clubs in other countries, it is focused on Italy, and Juventus in particular.
The media have also been left in a state of shock by the FIGC ruling. It had been widely thought that Juve were in serious trouble – the resignation of the entire board was an ominous sign – but the severity of the sentence still took many by surprise. Indeed, it is worth noting that earlier on Friday Chine had only called for a nine-point penalty for Juve; instead, they were docked 15 points. ... They particularly wanted to know why only Juve had been punished, given it should, in theory, take two clubs to inflate a transfer fee. Remember, Sampdoria, Empoli, Genoa, Parma, Pisa, Pescara, Pro Vercelli and Novara were all absolved of any wrongdoing ... .
De Luna: We consulted the company financial statements, and noted the escalation of the emoluments that Moggi, Giraudo, and Bettega received. We don't have certain elements to be able to say that at that moment there was an attempt to take over Juventus, but those figures are impressive. Furthermore, there are some anomalies of the Agnellis which leave the door open to this type of hypothesis. The Calciopoli investigation was born out of a Turin investigation by the prosecutor Guariniello on the Juventus doping case, [in which] the interceptions of Moggi's conversations with the referees emerge. Guariniello sends the files to the boss Maddalena, notes that there are no crimes from a criminal point of view, but perhaps from a sporting point of view. Maddalena keeps the files for three months, then sends them to the [Italian] Football Federation. This period lasts a little over a year. Do you really [want to believe] that Juve didn't know what was going on? I have the impression that the Agnelli family took advantage of this opportunity to stop an attempt to take over the Moggi-Giraudo-Bettega company.
The Juventus defence, among other things, objects that a sum of several Articles 1 (unfair and dishonest sporting conduct) cannot lead to an indictment for Article 6 (sporting offence), using for example the metaphor that so many defamations do not carry a murder conviction: an unimpeachable objection. ... Hence the grotesque concept of 'standings altered without any match-fixing'. The 'Calciopoli' rulings state that there is no match-fixing. That the league under investigation, 2004–2005, is to be considered regular. But that the Juventus management has achieved effective standings advantages for Juventus FC even without altering the individual matches. In practice, Juventus were convicted of murder, with no one dead, no evidence, no accomplices, no murder weapon. Only for the presence of a hypothetical motive.
[p. 48] Corrado De Biase, the head of the investigations office at the time of the [1980s] betting scandal from 1980, ... about Juventus and the work of Zaccone, its lawyer: 'I can't know why the Juventus owners have moved in a certain way, but I would say, 99%, that the affair was skilfully managed by the leaders of the Turin club, starting with the request from Zaccone, who left everyone stunned. Zaccone isn't incompetent, as many believe, but he was only an actor in this story.' ... The point that makes me think that Zaccone acted on input from the owners is another, namely the way in which the top management of Juventus moved, with that fake appeal to the TAR. How, I wonder, you dismiss the executives, practically pleading guilty, then you watch inert and impassive a media and judicial destruction against your club and then you're threatening to resort to the TAR? It's the concept of closing the barn when the oxen have fled, if you think about it. ... [p. 50] I, on my own, can only reiterate the concept already expressed: a penalty of 8/10 points, a fine, and a ban of Moggi and Giraudo for 10/12 months, this was the appropriate penalty in my opinion. Any parallel with the story of 1980 is unthinkable: here there're no traces of offence, nor of money or checks. The environmental offence isn't a crime covered by any code, unless we're talking about air pollution.'
'... [p. 48] First you let yourself be massacred without lifting a finger, you have the title disassigned, you have the calendars drawn up for the European championships and cups, and then you threaten to go to the TAR, trumpeting everything in the newspapers? It looks much like a political move to appease the wrath of the fans, I think. If Zaccone, who is a man of value and experience, would have had the mandate to avoid the disaster he would have moved in a different way, in the sense that he would have pointed out these 'anomalies' in the time between the trial and the announcement of the verdicts. That, in fact, was the right moment to threaten to appeal to the TAR, when the sentences had not yet been written, but had to be done in camera caritatis, asking for a meeting with [p. 49] Ruperto, Sandulli, and Palazzi, and not in front of the journalists of La Gazzetta dello Sport. ... Please note that I'm not discussing the high strategy of the forensic art, but the basic principles, the ABC of the profession, the things that are taught to the boys who come to the studio to do a traineeship: if you, the defence attorney, think you have weapons to play, you ask for a meeting with the judge and the public prosecution, in the period between the trial and the verdict, and point out that, if the response is judged too severe, you will use them. And here there were weapons in industrial quantities. Then, in the face of a fait accompli, who takes the responsibility of stopping a machine that grinds billions of euros, so as to be the sixth industry in the country?'
In an interview to ANSA, FIFA president Joseph Blatter reveals an unprecedented detail on Calciopoli: 'I think enough time has now passed to be able to talk about it ... When the scandal broke in 2006, Luca di Montezemolo played a very important role of moderator. It is largely thanks to him that Juventus did not turn to the ordinary courts after the sanctions resulting from the scandal.'
It was enough to look at what happened in Portugal, where a top-flight team, relegated for ascertained collusion with (arrested) referees, was reinstated following the appeal made to the counterpart of the Italian TAR. For Juve it would have been even easier, because in the sporting trial no crime was ascertained and in the ordinary one the referees were all acquitted. The prosecutor had to resort to the 'anticipated crime' for something never committed or even thought of.
... and for this reason some hypothesize that the Court decided on the basis of art. 4, paragraph 1, of the sporting justice code, i.e. intended to sanction the behavior of Juventus managers as contrary to the principle of sporting loyalty to which every club and each member is bound. 'This, however, presupposes a modification, by the Federal Court, of the charge advanced, according to what is known from the news, by the Federal Prosecutor's Office. The Federal Judge has ample powers in matters of juridical qualification of the disputed fact, but this power must never overflow into an alternative reconstruction of the ascertained and disputed facts. In any case, the 15-point penalty would appear difficult to understand if related to the violation of the principle of sporting loyalty. Abnormal.'
'Dear Lapo, my certainties about the perpetrators of this farce are known and always addressed to those who received the thanks of Blatter, president of Fifa at the time, for having Juve withdraw the appeal to the TAR which, if maintained, would have kept the club in Serie A.'
Among the most notable teams involved in the breakaway group is Juventus, the serial Italian champion. Its chairman, Andrea Agnelli, had been until Sunday — when he resigned from both posts — a member of UEFA's executive board and also the head of the European Club Association, an umbrella body for more than 200 top division clubs, the majority of which will be left out of the proposed Super League.
{{cite news}}: CS1 maint: numeric names: authors list (link)Giovanni Cobolli Gigli ... 'Benigni reminded us that Article 21, on freedom of thought, is the most important. However, the manifestation of one's ideas must always be limited to one's duties. Therefore, I believe that if these gentlemen want to express their thoughts, they must do so without playing the roles they currently do. Santoriello should have kept his feelings to himself as a judge, Juve's acquittal on that occasion counts for little.'
Ciro Santoriello, one of the three public prosecutors who support the prosecution in the Prisma investigation, says he is serene. The 2019 video in which he said he hated Juventus didn't upset him that much. Also because the video ended with the memory of having asked for a case involving Andrea Agnelli to be dismissed.
Did the 'attention' that Ciro Santoriello, the prosecutor of the Juventus capital gains investigation, dedicated to the Juventus club derive only from his in-depth investigative activity, or also from an atavistic personal and sporting hatred for the Old Lady? It is the doubt that has been circulating among Juventus fans and beyond since last night, when a video from 2019 bounced around in all the chats and on the web ... in which the magistrate candidly confessed that he was 'tifosissimo of Napoli' and 'hated Juventus'. Statements made in front of a professional audience gathered in Milan for a conference dedicated to the 'prevention of offenses between criminal and sports justice.'
... the context in which Santerello's claims took place: a conference organized in Milan by Studio Fornari e Associati together with Studio Grassi e Associati and PwC TLS on 14 June 2019 with the full title The Organizational Model and Football Clubs: The Prevention of Offenses Between Criminal and Sporting Justice. Phrases that appear very serious, uttered by a magistrate who – as Santerello candidly confessed in the video – was called to deal with judging cases of possible offenses committed by various Serie A teams. ... also attracted the attention of the Minister of Sports, Andrea Abodi. ... he wrote laconically on Twitter: 'I have seen, listened to, and reported, in compliance with the roles, for the appropriate checks and evaluations. For now, I think it is correct that I stop here.'
... of the Prisma investigation into Juve's accounts, which 'On March 27 will have the preliminary hearing in which it will be decided whether the case will be closed or not. I don't want Juventus to be forced to endure all this time. A new board of directors can better represent the club and has nothing to do with the allegations. Furthermore, I am free to defend myself in court against any allegations that should arise', he responds quickly.
Juventus ask, principally, to the Board of Guarantee to cancel the contested decision for the inadmissibility of the appeal for revocation of the Federal Prosecutor's Office without postponement, not constituting the investigation documents sent by the Public Prosecutor's Office at the Court of Turin 'New facts' suitable for subverting the ratio decidendi of the revocated sentence. In the alternative, the club asks to cancel the decision for violation of the principles of the contradictory and the right trial sanctioned, as well as for violation of the right of defense. The appeal also proposes other reasons to request cancellation without postponement and also suggests 'canceling the sentence for violation of the principles of the right trial'. Regarding the sanction, Juve ask to cancel the decision of the Federal Court of Appeal for omitted motivation on the quantification of the penalties imposed in violation of Art. 12 CGS FIGC and in violation of the principle of proportionality in the sanctioning treatment. Finally, the Juventus club asks in the extreme subordinate to dispose of the postponement to the competent federal sports justice body, which will want — according to the principle of law sanctioned by the guarantee college — reforming the contested decision in favour of the applicant. In addition to that of the Juventus company, the Guarantee College of Guarantee received the appeals of the former Juventus chairman Andrea Agnelli and the former sports director Fabio Paratici. CONI makes it official.
... the motivations in 558 pages are summarized as follows. 1) Leagues not altered (therefore leagues unjustly taken away from Juve...), matches not fixed, referees not corrupted, investigations conducted incorrectly by the investigators of the Public Prosecutor's Office (interceptions of the Carabinieri which were even manipulated in the confrontation in the Chamber). 2) The SIM cards, the foreign telephone cards that Moggi has distributed to some referees and designators, would be proof of the attempt to alter and condition the system, even without the effective demonstration of the rigged result. 3) Moggi's attitude, like a real 'telephone' boss, is invasive even when he tries to influence the [Italian Football Federation] and the national team, see the phone calls with Carraro and Lippi. 4) That these phone calls and this 'mafia' or 'sub-mafia' promiscuity aimed at 'creating criminal associations' turned out to be common practice in the environment as is evident, does not acquit Moggi and C.: and therefore here is the sentence. ... Finally point 1), the so-called positive part of the motivations, that is, in fact everything is regular. And then the scandal of 'Scommettopoli' [the Italian football scandal of 2011] in which it's coming out that the 2010–2011 league [won by Milan] as a whole with tricks is to be considered really and decidedly irregular? The Chief Prosecutor of Cremona, Di Martino, says so for now, while sports justice takes its time as always, but I fear that many will soon repeat it, unless everything is silenced. With all due respect to those who want the truth and think that Moggi has objectively become the 'scapegoat'. Does the framework of information that does not investigate, analyse, compare, and take sides out of ignorance or bias seem slightly clearer to you?
The journalist Carlo Nesti has his opinion on the 15-point penalty imposed on Juventus for the capital gains case: 'It seems to relive the days of Calciopoli, with the same reasons of legitimacy, but also of persistence. Surely the punishment, inflicted on Juventus, is obvious, in the light of 2 articles: the 4, which obliges to observe the principles of sporting loyalty, and the 31, which condemns the management and economic violation. We can discuss, if anything, the proportions of the penalty, whether they are fair, limited or you exaggerate. As in 2006, in any case, an inconsistency already emerges. How is it possible that other companies have not been sanctioned, when the phenomenon of capital gains was, and is, very widespread? Is it possible to make capital gains on your own? The answer, of course, is 'no', but the verdict, at least so far, does not seem to take this into account. Therefore, perplexities emerge about the umpteenth fury, as in the days of Calciopoli, towards the Black and White club.'
During the exposition of his defensive line, the Juventus lawyer Nicola Apa asked that the revocation procedure be rejected for a formal question. The Public Prosecutor's Office allegedly exceeded the time limit for presenting the request. As emerged from press articles, the Public Prosecutor's Office had contacted the Turin prosecutors on 26 October and on 27 October the news of a visit to Turin by a prosecutor's envoy had spread. So the first new facts would have come into the possession of the prosecution at the end of October. And the sporting justice code prescribes a 30-day deadline for submitting the revocation request, which arrived, however, only on December 22, i.e. 56 days later.
Justice decided that Moggi and Giraudo actually 'polluted' the system, it decided so in 2006 and did not want to know or understand other truths. Indeed, it had already decided it during the investigations, when all the phone calls that could exonerate or alleviate the position of Juventus' executives had not been taken into consideration, to the point of dismantling the very concept of the Cupola. Moggi and Giraudo, therefore, 'polluted' the system: a term that serves to dodge the fact that no judge has ever returned enough evidence to affirm that the league (the subject of investigation was only 2004–05) has actually been altered. Indeed, in the first instance sentence we basically read the opposite.
Judge Santoro, former President of the Federal Court of Appeal of the FIGC and of the Council of State, as an expert in the field of sports justice ... 'The reasons for the sentence of the Federal Court of Appeal have increased the doubts that I had already raised previously on the legitimacy of the revocation: to justify the reopening of the trial, new facts must arise which the judges identified in the telephone interceptions transmitted by the Turin Public Prosecutor' ... 'First of all, the interceptions cannot be used to prove accounting offences: in this case, the judges consider the capital gains, with artificial values given to the players, accounting offenses with which Juventus allegedly distorted the balance sheets.' ... 'To prove an accounting offense, technical advice is needed, which I have not seen when reading the pages of the reasons, because the judges do not have the competence in the matter: the lack of technical advice has also prevented the defendants from the right of defense . And then there is a second aspect of wiretapping.' ... 'Interceptions are not admissible both in the first phase of the revocation, the rescission phase, which requests the annulment of the contested provision, as I explained earlier, but also in the second phase, the rescission phase, in which a new provision is issued intended to replace the first.'
'Juventus Football Club and its legal team have carefully read and will analyse thoroughly the reasons, published a little while ago, of the decision of the United Sections of the Federal Court of Appeal. It is a document, predictable in content, in the light of the weighty decision, but vitiated by obvious illogicality, lack of motivation and unfoundedness in point of law, which the Company and the individuals will oppose with an appeal to the Guarantee College at CONI within the set deadlines. The validity of Juventus' reasons will be asserted firmly, while respecting the institutions that issued it.'
'Juventus Football Club and its legal team have carefully read and will analyse thoroughly the reasons, published a little while ago, of the decision of the United Sections of the Federal Court of Appeal. It is a document, predictable in content, in the light of the weighty decision, but vitiated by obvious illogicality, lack of motivation and unfoundedness in point of law, which the Company and the individuals will oppose with an appeal to the Guarantee College at CONI within the set deadlines. The validity of Juventus' reasons will be asserted firmly, while respecting the institutions that issued it.'
'Bone-sack interceptions, as they say in jargon, that is, without comment, without legal qualifications, are a simple transcription of speeches: drawing a conclusion of imputability from this is not permitted.' ... 'No, they should have opened a new referral and proceeded with a new trial. There are 14,000 pages of interceptions: congratulations to the two judges who managed to read them all in the space of a few weeks...' The Federal Court has also changed the charge: from article 31, which only provides for a fine, in article 4, the one on loyalty, which instead provides for penalty points... 'The change of crime is another highly questionable element: having brought up loyalty is a consequence of the accounting offense but it can represent a procedural defect even stronger. This proceeding has already undergone two levels of judgment and it would have already been serious to change the charge in the appeal process, i.e. in the second level: here instead we are faced with a change even in the revocation phase, when the judges have a much more limited power. The federal judge must never overflow into an alternative reconstruction of the established and disputed facts. In any case, the 15-point penalty appears difficult to understand, if related to the violation of the principle of sporting loyalty.'
Of course there is a precedent that is also quite close in time: Milan and Inter ended up on trial in 2008 for the 2004 budgets, which ended up in the sights of the Judiciary for the usual capital gains. But they were acquitted because 'the fact does not constitute a crime'. The problem is the scientific definition of the value of a player in the transfer market. In short, there are no exact parameters for deciding that an evaluation is 'false', given that the number of factors and conditions that can influence it. Thirteen years after the acquittal of the Milanese [clubs], the investigation brings back the age-old question of capital gains in the offices of a prosecutor, just as [FIFA president] Infantino, only a couple of weeks ago, hypothesized the introduction of a mathematical algorithm to decide the player rating.
'Consistently, the Federal Prosecutor in the hearing before the Federal Court and the Court of Appeal had requested the pecuniary sanction of the fine, of 800 thousand euros for Juventus and, gradually, for the other clubs. Requests then rejected in both levels of judgment.'
... the motivations in 558 pages are summarized as follows. 1) Leagues not altered (therefore leagues unjustly taken away from Juve...), matches not fixed, referees not corrupted, investigations conducted incorrectly by the investigators of the Public Prosecutor's Office (interceptions of the Carabinieri which were even manipulated in the confrontation in the Chamber). 2) The SIM cards, the foreign telephone cards that Moggi has distributed to some referees and designators, would be proof of the attempt to alter and condition the system, even without the effective demonstration of the rigged result. 3) Moggi's attitude, like a real 'telephone' boss, is invasive even when he tries to influence the [Italian Football Federation] and the national team, see the phone calls with Carraro and Lippi. 4) That these phone calls and this 'mafia' or 'sub-mafia' promiscuity aimed at 'creating criminal associations' turned out to be common practice in the environment as is evident, does not acquit Moggi and C.: and therefore here is the sentence. ... Finally point 1), the so-called positive part of the motivations, that is, in fact everything is regular. And then the scandal of 'Scommettopoli' [the Italian football scandal of 2011] in which it's coming out that the 2010–2011 league [won by Milan] as a whole with tricks is to be considered really and decidedly irregular? The Chief Prosecutor of Cremona, Di Martino, says so for now, while sports justice takes its time as always, but I fear that many will soon repeat it, unless everything is silenced. With all due respect to those who want the truth and think that Moggi has objectively become the 'scapegoat'. Does the framework of information that does not investigate, analyse, compare, and take sides out of ignorance or bias seem slightly clearer to you?
The Calciopoli scandal in 2006 resulted in the Bianconeri being relegated from Serie A and stripped of two league titles, with the club and former general manager Luciano Moggi accused of having an exclusive relationship with referee designators. However, civil and criminal trials have since determined that Juventus and Moggi did not enjoy such an advantage and that the punishments handed out in 2006 were based on incomplete evidence, and Moggi's prison sentence was also written off last week following his appeal at the Court of Cassation. As a result of the subsequent findings, Juventus have filed a lawsuit against the FIGC and are claiming €443m for lost revenue and damage to their reputation.
... Sergio Santoro, former president of the federal court of the FIGC and member of the Italian Council of State — perhaps the most prominent person to talk about the case. He says 'I find it unusual that the president of the court that handed down the sentence in January 2023 is the same one who, in May 2022, issued the sentence of acquittal in the same trial. ... We don't know if the court has decided to sanction Juventus and its directors for the capital gains affair. If this were the case, it would be a decision in contrast with the precedents of intra-federal justice in matters of capital gains. We need to understand the reasons for this sudden change in jurisprudence. Furthermore, if the penalty imposed is a consequence of capital gains violations, it is unclear how this violation could have been committed by a single company. The capital gain is realized by at least two subjects, while in the case in question no other companies appear to have been punished for this offence.'
... even Juventus itself at a certain point realized that this system wasn't generating benefits, but costs ('shit'). And it was Juventus itself that began to think: we have to change, these capital gains are causing us more harm than good. Andrea Agnelli used the same expression that I used before him: 'we flooded the car'. And so there was self-criticism as well as a clear change in behaviour.
Let's assume that there are these phone calls in which Juventus says: 'I'm inflating the price of a player', therefore 'confessing': is it false accounting? And how bad is it? In the words of ... lawyer Francesco Andrianopoli ... 'A clarification: Juventus did not engage in a false/fraudulent operation with these capital gains. In the field of financial statements, it is fraud when an entry that does not exist is entered in the financial statements. For example: I sell an asset for €100,000, but I don't actually own that asset. When, on the other hand, items are entered in the balance sheet that have been valued incorrectly, excessively, or in incorrect years, that is not a 'falsehood' but an 'incorrect entry', which is a balance sheet irregularity but not a crime or an offence. What we are talking about, in terms of capital gains, is not 'false' data, because there are two teams that exchange two players and say: 'mine is worth 20, yours is worth 20, let's make this exchange so you make a capital gain and I make a capital gain' whereas the 'real' value (which is impossible to determine for those players) is not 20 but something less. At this point, there is no falsehood: first of all because not the entire value is fictional: perhaps those players, instead of being worth 20 and 20, were worth (if anyone can ascertain it) 10 and 10, but certainly not 0 and 0. Secondly: on their balance sheets, each of the two teams put both the positive entry of +20 and the negative entry of -20. So it is not the situation mentioned above where a non-existent (false) asset is sold and an operation is carried out by introducing only a positive (fraudulent) component to the balance sheet. In addition to the immediate capital gain of 20 million, in subsequent years the team will find their costs increased by 20 million. So there is no positive result on the long-term financial statements; there is the problem that these items end up on different financial statements, but that is very different from saying that they are 'false'.
Of course there is a precedent that is also quite close in time: Milan and Inter ended up on trial in 2008 for the 2004 budgets, which ended up in the sights of the Judiciary for the usual capital gains. But they were acquitted because 'the fact does not constitute a crime'. The problem is the scientific definition of the value of a player in the transfer market. In short, there are no exact parameters for deciding that an evaluation is 'false', given that the number of factors and conditions that can influence it. Thirteen years after the acquittal of the Milanese [clubs], the investigation brings back the age-old question of capital gains in the offices of a prosecutor, just as [FIFA president] Infantino, only a couple of weeks ago, hypothesized the introduction of a mathematical algorithm to decide the player rating.
Among the most notable teams involved in the breakaway group is Juventus, the serial Italian champion. Its chairman, Andrea Agnelli, had been until Sunday — when he resigned from both posts — a member of UEFA's executive board and also the head of the European Club Association, an umbrella body for more than 200 top division clubs, the majority of which will be left out of the proposed Super League.
{{cite news}}: CS1 maint: numeric names: authors list (link)It was enough to look at what happened in Portugal, where a top-flight team, relegated for ascertained collusion with (arrested) referees, was reinstated following the appeal made to the counterpart of the Italian TAR. For Juve it would have been even easier, because in the sporting trial no crime was ascertained and in the ordinary one the referees were all acquitted. The prosecutor had to resort to the 'anticipated crime' for something never committed or even thought of.
FIGC's actions in relegating Juventus and handing the title to Inter Milan were somewhat peculiar. Of course, Moggi and Juventus deserved punishment; that is not up for dispute. However, the severity of the ruling and the new location for the Scudetto was unprecedented and arguably should never have happened. The final ruling in the Calciopoli years later judged that Juventus had never breached article 6. As a result, the Serie A champions should never have encountered a shock 1–1 draw away to Rimini in the season's curtain-raiser. Nor should they have trounced Piacenza 4–0 in Turin or handed a 5–1 thrashing away to Arezzo in Tuscany. The findings stated that some club officials had violated article 6, but none had originated from Juventus. FIGC created a structured article violation with their decision-making. This means that instead of finding an article 6 breach, several article 1 violations were pieced together to create evidence damning to warrant relegation from Italy's top flight. Article 1 violations in Italian football usually command fines, bans, or points deductions, but certainly not relegation.