To say the summer of 2006 was eventful in Italy is a bit of an understatement, even by their own standards. In mid-May Juventus were celebrating their record 29th Scudetto, two months later their captain had lifted the World Cup for the Azzurri in Germany, then weeks later the Old Lady found herself cast out of the top flight for the first ever time and starting the new season with Jean-Alain Boumsong marshalling their defence.

Yes, it was today in 2006 that the Italian Football Federation, or FICG for all you bi-linguists out there, announced its final rulings on the Calciopoli affair that rocked Italian football to the core. Juve were stripped of the two back-to-back titles they had just won, with FICG awarding the 2005/06 Scudetto to Inter and relegating Juve to Serie B in the process. Also indicted in the scandal were AC Milan, Fiorentina, Lazio and Reggina. Upon appeal these teams would end up with docked points, but all kept their top-flight status.

The whole sorry mess had come about when Italian papers had published transcripts of suspicious phone calls involving Juventus general manager Luciano Moggi and Pierluigi Pairetto, who was the vice-president of Uefa’s refereeing committee and also responsible for allocating referees in Serie A. Further transcripts showed Pairetto talking to various referees, as it became clear that Moggi was instigating a network of managers and officials that saw favourable referee appointments for those that were involved.



And he would’ve got away for it, but for those pesky Italian cops who only stumbled upon ‘Moggi-gate’ when they began tapping the phones of Italy’s leading football officials in order to investigate claims of organised doping of players. Moggi himself was banned from the game for five years and Juve saw an exodus of their star players, as Thuram, Ibrahimovic, Zambrotta, Emerson and Patrick Vieira all left the club in search of Champions League football. Juve’s two Fabio’s, manager Capello and talismanic captain Cannavaro both left for Real Madrid, as the financial realities of second-tier football and no Champions League pot of gold hit home for Juve.

Smugly looking on was Massimo Moratti, as his Internazionale side had now been awarded their first Scudetto since 1989, after years of heavy investment into the playing squad. As you can see by the footage below, straight from the terraces of the San Siro, their joy was in no way tempered by the circumstances that lead to their fifteenth title.

The dust has now settled on the Calciopoli scandal and, strangely enough for Italian football, most of the key players have come up smelling of roses. Juve stormed to the Serie B title, despite a nine-point handicap, and will take their place among the big-boys for the 2007-08 season following a brief sojourn out of the top flight, with a reported €100m transfer fund to boot. AC Milan, who were originally kicked out of the 2006-07 Champions League found themselves lifting the trophy for a seventh time in Athens and Lazio and Fiorentina will both find themselves playing in Europe this season. Whoever said Italian football was boring?

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