Alarming bell has already rung

Even Galliani has come out and voiced his concerns over serie A. We are going to fall further behind the european big leagues. Even Ligue 1 is going to catch us in co-efficient ranking within few years. Teams like Palermo and Udinese are making the task even easier. PSG are buying best stars from serie A now ... Sadly serie A has become a laughing stock... Teams like inter now can't afford any stars and still overlooking youth team gems ... It's now or never ... Clubs have to stop playing ridiculous boring football and those fuc**ng politicians will have to come up with plan for new stadiums... Serie A is nearly dead !!ng football and those fuc**ng politicians will have to come up with plan for new stadiums... Serie A is nearly dead !!

maruf063 wrote:Even Galliani has come out and voiced his concerns over serie A. We are going to fall further behind the european big leagues. Even Ligue 1 is going to catch us in co-efficient ranking within few years. Teams like Palermo and Udinese are making the task even easier. PSG are buying best stars from serie A now ... Sadly serie A has become a laughing stock... Teams like inter now can't afford any stars and still overlooking youth team gems ... It's now or never ... Clubs have to stop playing ridiculous boring football and those fuc**ng politicians will have to come up with plan for new stadiums... Serie A is nearly dead !!ng football and those fuc**ng politicians will have to come up with plan for new stadiums... Serie A is nearly dead !!

Lol take it easy bro. First off, I don't see what the line in red has to do with anything, nor is it true. I personally do not find Serie A games boring at all and the diversity when it comes to tactics throughout the league is quite interesting to watch, and will be even moreso this season.

Serie A is not dead, but has to change. Certain teams are showing the will to improve and our contributing to lifting Calcio back up, while others unfortunately are not helping our case (coughUdinesecough). But let's leave things like stadiums out of this argument that Serie A is "dying". It's easy for us to say build this and build that, but do you any idea how complex it is to lay out the plans, find the proper funding, find the location and so on. At the end of the day, there are other problems that need to be addressed first.

Bro, i am not an Italian and i don't know about laws, but one thing is sure, England, spain, Germany and France are miles ahead regarding infrastructure. Regarding quality of football, you will have to ask neutral and general supporters because they account for 90% of the total supporters. I guess majority of them consider Serie A as pre historic league where results count for more than anything. I am a die hard serie A fan but i am not biased, neither do i have any obligation to call serie A the best league like Carlo Garganese because i am not italian. But i also know that 75% of those games are boring where in England and Spain, the percentage won't be more than 30%... That's truth and we have to admit that. We need teams like Roma and Udinese who can entertain and attract neutral supporters. Most of the serie a fans are italian and who are born before 1990. Do you think a boy who was born in 2006 will ever support Fiorentina instead of Spurs, villareal or Hamburg? ... There is the real difference. No one wants to watch turtle race, they crave for dynamic and entertaining football. Lastly, serie A has lost it's tactical superiority long ago, there are no Herrera or Sacchi in Serie A anymore ... Afterall who cares about tactics when it's that much boring

^ Yes neutral supporters account for more than Serie A supporters, but I'm sure Serie A supporters know a heck of a lot more about the league and are more capable of appreciating the different tactics adopted by different coaches. I'm sure the average EPL or La Liga fan doesn't really know who Alberto Malesani or Stefano Pioli are and are therefore not familiar enough with their styles to really appreciate their team's play (in this case, last season's Bologna and Chievo respectively).

maruf063 wrote:I guess majority of them consider Serie A as pre historic league where results count for more than anything

Well, results do count for more than anything, don't they? You could play the nicest football in the world (full out attack, possession, quick passing football)...if you can't win, it won't matter at all.

maruf063 wrote:But i also know that 75% of those games are boring where in England and Spain, the percentage won't be more than 30%... That's truth and we have to admit that.

I don't see how you could put something like level of entertainment, to different people mind you, into percentages. I personally don't find 75% of Serie A games boring and I'm sure many other people don't either. At the same time, I'm sure many neutrals have not seen many Serie A games either, if any. Entertainment means different things to different people and is so subjective that it can't possibly be measured and applied to this type of scenario.

maruf063 wrote:Most of the serie a fans are italian and who are born before 1990. Do you think a boy who was born in 2006 will ever support Fiorentina instead of Spurs, villareal or Hamburg?

I don't think a 5 year old would go for any of those teams unless he lives in those cities to be honest. And there are huge numbers of non-Italian Serie A fans. There are fans of all the big leagues all over the world and you can't simply say most Serie A fans were born before 1990 because most football fans in total were born before 1990.

maruf063 wrote:No one wants to watch turtle race, they crave for dynamic and entertaining football. Lastly, serie A has lost it's tactical superiority long ago, there are no Herrera or Sacchi in Serie A anymore ... Afterall who cares about tactics when it's that much boring

Tactical superiority? Not to be biased or anything, but Italy definitely has not lost their tactical superiority. Serie A still has some great coaches around implementing all kinds of different styles of play. And sure, there's no more Herrera or Sacchi (obviously if you're looking back, it's hard to find a young coach that matches up). But we do have many young coaches ready to experiment with different styles of play and that have already been very successful (prime example: Allegri). And I can't help but see a small contradiction in your statements. You're craving "entertaining football" but yet you praise Helenio Herrera, the master of Catenaccio. Then you go on to say who cares about tactics when they're so boring...

Bro, i wanted to tell that, a boy born in 06 in new york will never support Fiorentina instead of Spurs when he is 15-20 years old... Football is an ever evolving game and serie A hasn't understood that you can't enchant someone by playing like some stoke city or Chievo... There are stoke cities in every league but in Italy there are too many. Secondly, you have listed Allegri as a really talented coach. And according to you he is the best coach in Serie A just because he "miraculously" kept Cagliari in serie a and made Milan champ !!! Hell no ... He kept cagliari in serie A because there were lot of inferior teams at the moment. In Europe, he was below average with Milan ... A master tactician like lippi, ancelotti would have never lost to a team who is nowhere near you. They may have lost to a ManU or Barca instead. But no spurs. I bet you, milan will crash out in last 16 unless they face teams like Rangers...Allegri won serie a because he had a far better squad and his opponents had coaches like the ultimate loser Ranieri, leonardo the general director and the great del neri. Do we have any up and coming Guardiola, villas Boas, blanc or even Luis Enrique ? No! Once serie A was hailed as a defensive fortress... Milan lost at home to spurs, inter to shalke and Roma to Shaktar!!! Is this sign of tactical superiority ... I don't think so...

I just love Galliani. He knows the truth and he is bold enough to say that. But he knows that he can't do anything other than moaning. At least he isn't living in a world out of the realm ! Thanks God !

maruf063 wrote:Bro, i wanted to tell that, a boy born in 06 in new york will never support Fiorentina instead of Spurs when he is 15-20 years old... Football is an ever evolving game and serie A hasn't understood that you can't enchant someone by playing like some stoke city or Chievo... There are stoke cities in every league but in Italy there are too many. Secondly, you have listed Allegri as a really talented coach. And according to you he is the best coach in Serie A just because he "miraculously" kept Cagliari in serie a and made Milan champ !!! Hell no ... He kept cagliari in serie A because there were lot of inferior teams at the moment. In Europe, he was below average with Milan ... A master tactician like lippi, ancelotti would have never lost to a team who is nowhere near you. They may have lost to a ManU or Barca instead. But no spurs. I bet you, milan will crash out in last 16 unless they face teams like Rangers...Allegri won serie a because he had a far better squad and his opponents had coaches like the ultimate loser Ranieri, leonardo the general director and the great del neri. Do we have any up and coming Guardiola, villas Boas, blanc or even Luis Enrique ? No! Once serie A was hailed as a defensive fortress... Milan lost at home to spurs, inter to shalke and Roma to Shaktar!!! Is this sign of tactical superiority ... I don't think so...

Listen, I agree that Calcio has to change in order to catch up to the EPL and La Liga which have surpassed us. But I'm not going to exaggerate and start saying everything needs to be revamped. There are some points on which we very much need to improve (stadiums yes, but it's much more difficult than some people make it seem... then on youth systems, and so on). First of all, I don't see your point in saying that there are too many stoke city-type teams in Serie A. We actually have very good midtable teams and lower league teams, probably better than those in the EPL and Liga (there was a thread in the right back section comparing the mid table players in all 3 leagues and Serie A dominated).

Also, I never said Allegri is the best coach in Serie A. I just said he's the best example of our young coaches experimenting with different types of football. Leonardo and Del Neri I'll give you, they weren't great... actually for Leonardo, he just wasn't good defensively. Anyways, Allegri didn't miraculously keep Cagliari in Serie A, he just built a strong and had them playing some good football. Under him, they did very well. As for his first year with Milan, at first he was quite Ibra-dependent. But as the season went on, he got Milan playing very well in which his midfield set up was key. He used Boateng perfectly in a slightly more advanced position which gave the team the right balance, instead of going with a purely attack minded trident. And Tottenham beat them by one goal in a tie that could have easily went Milan's way. It was his first Champions League experience, give the guy a chance. Ultimate loser Ranieri? You probably have never taken the time to actually look at his work. He was the reason Chelsea became a big team under Mourinho, he set up that team completely. And finally, yes we have many up and coming young coaches...

Serie A is finished....

The league's in a huge free fall and nothing can save it.

In five years, France AND Portugal will pass Italy.

Portugal certainly won't.

I agree that something needs to be done but using last season as an example Italian football is not boring or defensive!

There are a variety of styles and that's what makes it entertaining to watch! The prem is played at a high tempo and balls are hoofed up the pitch- very predictable and boring to watch.

As we discussed in the saving calcio thread, something needs to change now.

A useful starting point would be suing the crap out of anyone that labels Serie A boring or defensive in the Media. Because that is absolute Slander. The fact that sky were allowed to spew out this shit during the nineties and early 2000's is unreal.

Conspiracy Theory
It's all about money- they couldnt afford Serie A when back in the mid nineties when more brits for example would watch Serie A than English football in the weekend when Football Italia on channel 4 was one of the most popular programmes on telly. Noone said Italian football was defensive then. And since then we've seen Milan destroy teams in the champs league with beautiful football, the national team play three upfront and win the WC much more convincingly than Spain, and Inter murder Barca 3-1. Domestically we've seen sides like Bari take it to the San Siro- Udinese beat palermo 7-0 and a 4-4 draw between that same side and AC Milan. Yet the media gets away with spinning shit about Cartenaccio which hasn't been popular or successful in Italy since the 70s.

Sue the bastards. They are poisoning idiots minds about Calcio for their own financial gain. Serie A is really losining out because of this.

Eventually- we WILL need stadiums. Let's get them built. Juve have gone for it- Roma, Milan and Inter need to follow. These sides can afford it without assistance from the broke government.

I'd like to see one side buy and develop the San Siro. The Stadio Olimpico would be good refurbished too. Get the ticket prices right down and get people back to the stadiums. Give the tickets away if you have to!

We don't need to sell out to Arabs + Americans like everyone else has done either.

This topic has to be kidding me...

Inter won with those 'boring tactics'...
Milan won back in 2007.

We are good, nothing is wrong.

Mike, this is why I consider you one of the best and smartest guys on here. Good job bro.

I didn't say nothing was wrong Sciacca I actually posted a thread on this myself in this very subforum. Look for fixing Calcio. There are horrible horrible craters in the league we all love and its a tragedy what is happening.

If you refer to what I said here I was talking about the perception being fed to us by the media that Calcio is boring- one which seemed to come out of the blue with no proof some time during the mid nineties when it was the most popular league. I picked out a few stand out examples in this ten or 15 year period which proved my point. I could have easily also said Juve before Calciopoli- who were successful and didn't exactly play boring football.

At no point during the last 20 years has Italian football been defensive or boring. (Cartenaccio dominating) Winning has certainly come above all else- and games can fizzle out in the last 20 or so minutes I agree- but this trend is even changing now.

As for Inter winning the CL- they were solid at the back yes- but they played well, and were by no means boring to watch.

3-1 against Barca was just incredible.

I never said you were wrong.

Bro, don't get biased. You all know lot more than me regarding Calcio and i am just another normal supporter. I know nothing about tactics, my previous experience says it is pathetically slow... I won't argue with you because i fear that you are biased.

maruf063 wrote:Bro, don't get biased. You all know lot more than me regarding Calcio and i am just another normal supporter. I know nothing about tactics, my previous experience says it is pathetically slow... I won't argue with you because i fear that you are biased.

Who are you talking about...

Mezzogiornese, I very much agree with you. Though something like "entertainment" is quite subjective, I don't think anyone could say that Calcio is not entertaining. Last year was anything but boring... not only the games themselves, but the different scenarios and rivalries: the Champions League and Europa League fights were on until the very end and even the relegation battle was interesting to watch (a team like Sampdoria completely faltering, while Lecce fought for their lives to stay up). And as you pointed out, there were some truly memorable games with mindblowing results. As for suing people who label Calcio as boring, well I don't think there's valid ground to do that, but we could just publicly call out their ignorance, especially when they use the word "Catenaccio" which really pisses me off (it's a technical term and is completely outdated).

@ Maruf063, I'm not being biased because I'm not saying Calcio is perfect. There are changes that need to be made as we have fallen seriously behind La Liga and EPL. We're now behind Germany in co-efficient points and if we're not careful, France will catch us eventually (PSG being the first major contender there). Now, I don't agree with the co-efficient system because I don't see how winning the Europa League could be labeled as equal to winning the Champions League. But we have to accept it and work around that. Secondly, I'm not being biased, though I will defend Calcio when it is being attacked for the wrong reasons, the main one being it's label as being defensive and boring, which is absolutely untrue.

And I just wanted to finish off my previous post which kind of trailed off because I was in a rush. Regarding our younger tacticians, we do have some promising ones. I'll start with the one I know best, Vincenzo Montella. Quite attack minded, favouring a Luciano Spalletti-like approach with a little more defensive awareness by having his wingers track further back. It was tough to judge his time with Roma since he used a formation which we were already familiar with, but he did average about 1.7 points per game which was good for a team struggling like we were. Then there's Antonio Conte, very attack minded with his prefered 4-2-4 formation. He brought Siena right back up into Serie A and, given the right players with Juventus, could get them playing some great attacking football. Walter Mazzari managed to bring Napoli to the top of the Serie A... his 3-5-2 approach worked wonders last season, especially due to his excellent use of Cavani, Lavezzi and Hamsik. The list goes on with Pioli and Malesani, who I've already named as they did a great job last season, and on with Guidolin, Gasperini (he's still quite young, only 53) and Giampaolo. Then there are two, possibly three, much lesser known coaches with bright futures, Pierpaolo Bisoli and Giuseppe Sannino, followed by Eusebio Di Francesco. All in all, coaching is not where we're going wrong since we have a long list of both accomplished and younger, up and coming tacticians.

sciacca wrote:This topic has to be kidding me...

Inter won with those 'boring tactics'...
Milan won back in 2007.

We are good, nothing is wrong.

Mike, this is why I consider you one of the best and smartest guys on here. Good job bro.

Go and read today's headlines of newspapers. Voeller said Germany has overtaken Italy only because of depending on youngsters. Our teams destroys youth. Show me another Nesta, maldini or even Vieri... Ranocchia is considered as new canna!! Are u kidding? Coaches and owners like ranieri, delneri, reja and each and every serie A coach is destroying our youth. We have more promising youngsters than Spain but these fuc**ing coaches are fielding a 40year old superstar rather than relying on a promising 18 year old. Walter sabatini and Baldini knew that, but they had no other options other than to go for Enrique. To me, all serie A coaches are shit because they don't promote youngstars of our youth academy and they have pre-historic mentality and tactics. Only Roma deserves credit. They are following the German model ...

maruf063 wrote:Go and read today's headlines of newspapers. Voeller said Germany has overtaken Italy only because of depending on youngsters. Our teams destroys youth. Show me another Nesta, maldini or even Vieri... Ranocchia is considered as new canna!! Are u kidding? Coaches and owners like ranieri, delneri, reja and each and every serie A coach is destroying our youth. We have more promising youngsters than Spain but these fuc**ing coaches are fielding a 40year old superstar rather than relying on a promising 18 year old. Walter sabatini and Baldini knew that, but they had no other options other than to go for Enrique. To me, all serie A coaches are shit because they don't promote youngstars of our youth academy and they have pre-historic mentality and tactics. Only Roma deserves credit. They are following the German model ...

I have to agree with you on this point. However Roma are buying foreign youth we've not seen anything of their own. Are Lamela, Bojan and Angel really going to be in the elite of tomorrow? If not approaching 100% sure about that I think young players bought in should at least be Italian.


As for your continued labeling of the Italian game as wrong, I'd advise you to watch a few more games next year. Despite all its faults, Italian football still has an ability to charm, surprise and amaze. Me and some typical Brits who held all the reservations you have explained watched it lots last year- yes of course there were bad games- show me a league where there isn't. However there were some truly magical games, that you couldn't see in any other league.

Let me pick you up on another point, you label Italian football slow paced, saying that doesn't appeal to people- yet who is the fashionable side at the moment? Barcelona. This is a side that play football at an incredibly slow pace for the most part- then when they speed up in an attacking move that's why it looks so appealing. Other sides people love at the moment? The Spanish NT (for some crazy reason after their woeful world cup), Holland, Argentina. None play at a fast premiership pace.

It's like any good musician's greatest alum- there's slow parts and quick parts. If it was all quick it'd be like some dutch gabber musician. Slowness and quickness compliment eachother in football- and this is why I don't like the typical premiership hoof the ball up the pitch tactic- leading to predictable games and until recently hugely predictable tables.

This idea that slow means boring is manufactured by sky, I'm 100% sure of it, back in the nineties. People need to stop believing whats spoon-fed to them and think for themselves.

If you like the premiership style of football then that's fine, watch that. If you like fast paced sports try American ones like Ice Hockey, Basketball, and American Football- if you appreciate beauty- and are not particularly turned on by watching the women's 100m at the olympics, Football is for you, because it is not a particularly fast game by nature.

I don't like premire league at all. They may b fast but no creativity. But i like la liga and Bundesliga. If you have watched Bundesliga then may already know that it's the perfect modern league. Roma are bringing through players like Viviani and Caprari. Montella would have never given them a chance. It's only matter of time before Roma (modern approach) and juve (new stadium) start ruling the italian football instead of those Milan giants.

maruf063 wrote:Go and read today's headlines of newspapers. Voeller said Germany has overtaken Italy only because of depending on youngsters. Our teams destroys youth. Show me another Nesta, maldini or even Vieri... Ranocchia is considered as new canna!! Are u kidding? Coaches and owners like ranieri, delneri, reja and each and every serie A coach is destroying our youth. We have more promising youngsters than Spain but these fuc**ing coaches are fielding a 40year old superstar rather than relying on a promising 18 year old. Walter sabatini and Baldini knew that, but they had no other options other than to go for Enrique. To me, all serie A coaches are shit because they don't promote youngstars of our youth academy and they have pre-historic mentality and tactics. Only Roma deserves credit. They are following the German model ...

You're exaggerating and generalizing your opinions. To say each and every Serie A coach destroys youth is not at all a credible statement, because it's just false. Certain coaches do tend to put their youth players aside, like Del Neri with Giovinco. But you're labeling Ranieri and Reja as bad coaches which makes no sense. Ranieri, first of all, does not destroy youth. He does not rely on them as much as some others, but he definitely does not destroy them. He was the one who got Menez playing well, something some other coaches couldn't do. Also, he played guys like Pettinari, Scardina, Faty, Rosi and Andreolli, while giving Greco his first chance to shine in the first team. And this is in a period where we couldn't afford to experiment because we had a lot of pressure on our shoulders. Then Allegri with Milan played Strasser, Merkel and even Berretta, teams like Udinese, Parma and Palermo always rely on youth. Yes, we should find away to further exploit our promising youngsters and develop them even further, but saying that we are destroying them is completely untrue. And lastly, Sabatini and Baldini did have other options, many options in fact. They could have went for Rossi, Gasperini, Deschamps, Pioli, Ancelotti (if they really wanted to), or kept Montella, some of which are very good when it comes to developing youngsters. If you say all Serie A coaches are shit, then you're doing nothing but destroying the credibility of your statements.

maruf063 wrote:I don't like premire league at all. They may b fast but no creativity. But i like la liga and Bundesliga. If you have watched Bundesliga then may already know that it's the perfect modern league. Roma are bringing through players like Viviani and Caprari. Montella would have never given them a chance. It's only matter of time before Roma (modern approach) and juve (new stadium) start ruling the italian football instead of those Milan giants.

WHAT? Are you serious??? Do you even know anything about Montella? He came from the Allievi Nazionali (16 year old youth team). He worked with our youngsters and knows them better than anyone. Then, when he took on the first team, he gave Caprari (who he put in against Milan of all teams) and Florenzi their first caps, and was ready to put in Viviani as well. He also often brought guys like Ciciretti, Montini, Antei and Pigliacelli into the first team practices so they could start adapting to playing at a faster pace with world class players. He often put these youngsters ahead of our first team players... once again, the match against Milan. He put in Caprari instead of Menez in order to try and win the game, ballsy move that one by relying on his youth player.

Mike = God !

ErPupone has owned this thread.

Fukin King :king:

There is nothing wrong with Serie A in my opinion. I love it the way it is.

Taking into account recent CL championships it is the best league in the world...so why do we need to change?

If we consistently produce teams that win the biggest club competition in europe, I don't see whats wrong...

Haters gonna hate...

I didn't tell that serie A is bad. I just wanted to say that it is going downwards and the days of winning UCL are coming to an end. Sadly

maruf063 wrote:I didn't tell that serie A is bad. I just wanted to say that it is going downwards and the days of winning UCL are coming to an end. Sadly

It's actually the opposite. it was rock bottom after Calciopoli and now it's rising back.

Milanista bro, everyone knows that the financial situations of Serie A isn't good anymore... We don't have money, stars like kaka, zlatan, sneijder, sanchez are being sold or soon to be sold, no stadium, no investment, no credible youth policy !! These stories only point towards a blackhole ... Either we are all ignorant or we don't want to believe. I made a prediction, serie A sides are going to be a shame in UCL this year. I would be happy if proved otherwise.