Italian football is going through a profound structural crisis that goes far beyond sporting results. This was stated by Gabriele Gravina, former president of the Italian Football Federation (FIGC), who, after his recent departure from office, released a report detailing the main flaws of the system
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The document, presented after the elimination of the Italian national team, which was left out of a World Cup for the third consecutive time, describes an “economically unsustainable” model. According to the data collected, calcium records losses of more than 730 million euros per year, a figure that conditions long-term development
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Among the most critical points is the sporting performance of Serie A, which lags behind the main European leagues in key aspects such as intensity, pressure and capacity for imbalance. It also has a lower speed of play compared to competitions such as the Champions League.
For Gravina, the current model of Italian football is economically unsustainable
Another of the axes of the report points to the scant role of Italian soccer players and the dependence on players from other countries. In Serie A, foreigners occupy almost 67.9% of theminutes played, a figure much higher than that of other leagues such as Spain (39.6%) or France (48.3%). This trend, according to Gravina, limits the growth of local talent and has a direct impact on the level of the selection
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The leader also highlighted the flaws in youth training. Only two Italian clubs, Atalanta and Juventus, are among the 50 best youth teams in the world, while young people have fewer minutes in Primera and in European tournaments compared to other countries. In the same vein, he also explains that Italy currently has an aging league, with anaverage of 27 years in the number of players on the field
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On the other hand, the report focuses on infrastructure problems, one of the factors that hold back Italian football the most compared to other European powers. Gravina warns that most of the stadiums have obsolete conditions, with facilities that do not keep up with modern requirements or generate thenecessary income to sustain the
growth of clubs. Gravina wants Italian football to change its roots
In this context, the former leader also explained why these deficiencies persist over time. As he pointed out, there is a structural difficulty in intervening effectively within the system: "In the vast majority of cases, the impossibility of intervening effectively, due to both internal and external factors,has so far been imposed on the inability to identify possible solutions”. In addition, he stressed the need to redefine responsibilities: "It is necessary to clarify what are the real competencies of the federation, the leagues (and, therefore, the clubs) and the
institutions.”
Faced with this scenario, the document states that any attempt at reform must be profound and coordinated. Gravina argues that the only possible way out is to move forward with structural measures that overcome individual interests. As part of that plan, the former boss proposed allocating a percentage of betting revenues to the development of grassroots football, implementing fiscal incentives to encourage the training of under-23 players, reducing the number ofprofessional clubs and urgently accelerating the modernization of stadiums in the face ofEuro 2032
