In an interview with Italian radio station Rai Radio 1 show Radio Anch’io Lo Sport earlier on today, Giovanni Malago, the president of the Italian National Olympic Committee, has discussed the current confusion surrounding the Italian football calendar.
As a result of the Coronavirus outbreak in Italy, several fixtures in the past few weeks have been affected, including all three of Inter’s matches across all competitions in this time, and as a result, there is a lot of confusion with many sides unsure what games to prepare for.
Inter’s Serie A match against Sampdoria was postponed two weeks ago, their Europa League round of 32 second leg match against Ludogorets was played behind closed doors and the match with Juventus that should have taken place this past weekend was postponed despite it initially being decided that it would be played behind closed doors.
“These are uncontrollable hours, no doubt about that. This is a critical time, more unique than rare. There are many hypotheses that have entered in play, some mistakes have been made but the biggest one that can be done, is to not go on like this,” Malago remarked.
“We need to find a clear path to follow. The Lega assembly will be on Wednesday and a solution will have to be found.
“In previous years we already experienced problems with one day, I think we have to postpone the whole match day, so nobody thinks the league is distorted.
“I will greet everyone as usual and then the others will make the decisions. Personally, I believe we have to catch up on the weekend matches that we have just left behind.”
He then spoke on when he thinks the match between Juventus and Inter should be held.
“I believe that Monday 9 March is the right date for the game to be held. Juventus do not have the Champions League and Inter would have three days to recover before playing in the Europa League.”
