InterSpac President Carlo Cottarelli feels that Italian football is in need of a major overhaul in terms of its approach.
Speaking to Milan-based newspaper Gazzetta dello Sport, Cottarelli gave his thoughts on what needs to be done to bring the Italian game back to its best, as well as speaking about InterSpac.
Italy’s failure to qualify for a second World Cup in a row has prompted significant debate about how to improve the country’s footballing situation.
Meanwhile, no Italian team has reached the Champions League quarter-final stage for the second season in a row, demonstrating the gulf in glass compared to other domestic leagues despite some positive flashes.
Cottarelli has been pursuing major structural reforms at Inter specifically in the form of transitioning to a fan ownership model, but he believes that the changes should not stop there if Italian football is to be at its best.
“Italian football is a sector that needs a strategic re-think,” he said, “starting with stadiums that are rather old-fashioned and don’t allow us to earn as much as the sport deserves in this country, they are not places where families are happy to go.”
“I can’t speak of fan shareholding,” he went on, “which I still think is a good thing – there is evidence that initiatives of this kind can help to forge the bond between fans and clubs, thus increasing revenue.”
Of the InterSpac initiative, he said that “It’s a long-term project in which we believe and on which we continue to work internally.”
“Next summer we’ll go at it again, and likely will also publish the estimate of how much we could earn thanks to popular shareholders,” he added.
