Do you have reading comprehension problems? Marseille was relegated for financial irregularities, they lost there french title for match fixing.
Teams in Italy have been using the civil courts for years. Sometimes even successfully - Catania sued to stay in Serie B in 2003 (and won!). Believe it or not, that case was every bit as controversial in Italy then as the calciopoli affair was this summer. So where was FIFA then? The difference is, of course, that there was a World Cup this summer with the news media spreading the not-exactly-accurate news of a 'huge match-fixing scandal in Italy' daily around the world for a month. Without having any part of the actual trial(s), FIFA felt obligated to do SOMETHNG to protect its image. And this is it. They suddenly declared - after it's been done many times before and in a case that STARTED in Italy's justice system to begin with! - that Juventus (and never mind that Lazio and Fiorentina were also readying similar appeals, they singled out JUVENTUS) has no right to appeal to that same justice system. FIFA acts like it has nobody to answer to. There has to be a check somewhere. Otherwise, witch hunts like this one - tried in the media and in the court of public opinion (can you say Marco Materazzi?) - can happen again anytime, anywhere.
Big deal. The FFF was going to allow them to play in the top division until the financial irregularties arose.
The last game of the season. Marseilles was going to be playing in the Champion's League Final on Wednesday, so the in the previous game against Valenciennes, who was going to be relegated anyway, Tapie paid a couple of players to kind of "take it easy" against his team so that they could be fresh when they played in the Champion's League final. Whether is was fixed that Marseilles would win or not, I don't remember, but it would sure seem like it if you pay the opposing players to "take it easy" against your team.
The post that I was responding to was the following where Dante responded to AfrcnHrbMan: From what I read and understood, he was asking about a game that was fixed by Marseilles since there was no mention of Juve in the post. But, if I was mistaken, try to be more specific when commenting as in "Point to ONE game by Juve that was fixed".
Sure, that one post was confusing, but that's where it helps to read the entire thread - or at least the last several posts - to understand the context. AfrcnHrbMan was suggesting that the Marseilles case was not as bad as Juve's because Tapie fixed one match and not the entire season (implying that Moggi had done the latter). And Dante responded to the 'fixing of the entire season' comment by asking which (Juve) matches were fixed. The point being that NO specific Juventus matches have been identified as being fixed.
Don't you think that Moggi's actions constituted "fixing the whole season"? When the scandal broke, I thought that explains why Juve seemed to always be able to pull victory out of the jaws of defeat at the last minute. Although fixing the season so that Juve would have been able to go without one defeat during the whole scudetto would have been too obvious, making it so that there was the possiblity that they would win the majority of their games would be just as good and prevent people from asking too many awkward questions, which is what Moggi did. Since Juve always had such a talented team, everyone would chalk up Juve's ability to win to skill rather than receiving favorable treatment from referees. If another team, say Treviso had done this, it would have stuck out like a sore thumb, but Juve, it would be much harder to prove.
Certainly, the phone transcripts that have been released don't sound good. But the 'wow, that seems to explain a lot' line of reasoning doesn't constitute proof. It still irritates me that Moggi felt the need to do ANYTHING AT ALL, and I'm glad he's gone. Frankly, I'm not even really complaining about the punishment. I just feel that the sporting courts are possibly more susceptible to being biased to the desires of the league or the influence of public opinion, so I fully support Juve's right to appeal to a civil court.
I agree that Juve should appeal also...not because they deserve to be in Serie A because believe me they don't...only because all the other cheaters like MIlan, Fiorentina, and Lazio have been sent back up...their will always be speculations and things and it's true that we will never really know what happened and who is guilty and who is not but all I know is that the Italian courts and the FIGC have done nothing at all and have only worsened matters by their dumb decisions...they allow teams to appeal 50times until they get what they want...the only thing I think teams have learned out of this is that cheating won't get you punished in the Italian leagues...I think that the system should be changed to define cheating in every way and if anyone is ever found breaking those rules no matter how harsh this may sounds, they should be relegated to the lowest leagues in Italy...no appeal, no nothing...make all the teams aware of these rules and whoever breaks them deserves what they get...
every team has probably broken rules...no doubt...but no every team cheats like Juve, Fiorentina, Lazio, and Milan...
Simply responding to romanista31's high-and-mighty rant with a reminder of a previous exchange between the two of us when he suggested that Roma has never 'gotten away with' doing anything wrong. For those who weren't a party to that exchange, I cited three examples of Roma rulesbreaking in recent years (Cafu's false passport, Sensi's Rolex watch gifts to referees, and the forged bank guarantees which allowed Roma to remain in Serie A last summer after they were initially barred from entry).
Juve has been accused of those things to...every team has and of course it isn't right but atleast we do not tamper with the outcome of a match!
Moggi was caught on tape attempting to influence the referee selection process. I admit - this isn't right, and I believe Moggi was rightly fired and Juventus deserves some punishment - even though there is no proof that any matches WERE actually fixed. Some referees were given minor punishments, but none have been handed significant bans - as they certainly would have been if they were found to be purposely influencing the results of games. So ... why again would somebody give very expensive watches to referees other than to influence them?
Not knowing the rules around here with posting articles, let me give a link to an interesting article written by Gabriele Marcotti concerning this issue .... Is football still above the law?
Excellent stuff. Thanks for the link. That's what I've been trying to say here, but he says it much much better.
why would Roma do it so publicly though...they did it infront of everyone...and sure if you can get a ref on your side by treating him better and getting him to like your side more without actually paying him in private tjen why not...that's nothing wrong, I play hockey and you know how many times your super nice to the ref when he talks to you just to sort of get the edge so he likes you...it's all part of the game...how about Collina, the guy stopped reffing becasue he was sponsored by Opel and so was Milan or osmehting like that, that's not really right, he never did anything wrong. Sure man like I said everyone has probably done osmehting wrong in soccer no team is completley innocent, atleast that's what I think. It's all a matter of who does it worse.
No they didn't. It was only after a report in one of the newspapers did they fess up. The refs were ordered by the FIGC to return them.
I thought I read somewhere that the refs never actually returned them, something about if they returned them they would look like there was something shaddy going on, but they in essence kept them to prove that there was nothing to hide.
I just read something stunning in, IIRC, as.com (Spanish sports newspaper) A report : Juventus allegedly demanding 130 million Euro from FIGC in exchange for dropping their appeal in court , and keep the national team and clubs playing in international competitions Now it gets real fun if that is true...
http://www.as.com/articulo/futbol/J...rir/Justicia/dasftb/20060830dasdaiftb_49/Tes/ The link, albeit in Spanish...