The number one whistleblower disqualified for a history of (alleged) pressure on the technical leaders of the minor leagues. For now it remains in place but what next? The specter of commissionership by the FIGC
The Italian refereeing world is going through a new storm and, this time, not due to an error on the field or VAR. The president of the Hague (the association that contains the whistles), Antonio Zappi, was in fact disqualified on first appeal for 13 months. This was decided by the National Federal Court of the FIGC which judged the matter of the alleged, until a final ruling, pressure to bring about the resignation of the leaders of the Serie C and Serie D technical bodies. A verdict that fully confirms the request of the Football Federation Prosecutor’s Office made in the hearing which represented the moment of truth after months of venom and controversy.
In theory, Zappi should lapse, as he already has previous inhibitions in his curriculum that with this one exceed the two-year threshold. In reality, Zappi will remain in his post at least for a while, waiting for the second appeal to be held. Only if the conviction is confirmed will the forfeiture of the office of president of The Hague be triggered and the movement will find itself without its leadership.
To go in which direction? Certainly towards new elections which, however, may not be very close if the president of the FIGC, Gabriele Gravinaopted for the commissionership, thus starting the revolution that is in the drawer of the top management of Italian football with the creation of a group of professional referees with FIGC and Lega Calcio Serie A to guarantee investments for their training and to pay for their services.
The hearing before the TFN was not without tension. The FIGC Prosecutor’s Office, after two attempts to reach a settlement (without admission of responsibility) proposed by Zappi in recent weeks had failed, had requested a 13-month suspension, holding the president of the Hague responsible for what was contested against him at the time of the referral.
The lawyers of the whistleblower leader left the courtroom, as explained when the sentence was handed down: “The defenders, having noted the impossibility of carrying out an effective defence, had left the courtroom, thus awaiting the subsequent pronouncements of the TFN. Our client was denied the preliminary investigation requests made by us. We requested the cross-examination of the witnesses of the Federal Prosecutor’s Office, Ciampi and Pizzi, whose declarations constitute the backbone of the accusatory system, as well as the acquisition and examination of the related sports contracts, which were already the subject of another access procedure, with a hearing scheduled for on January 27. In the first instance the Court chose to proceed by postponing the evaluation of the hearing of the witnesses until “after the discussion on the merits”, reversing the order of the questions, and ordered the acquisition of the requested contracts in the file, granting the defenders a “jugulatory” deadline of only 45 minutes for the relevant examination which, in fact, emptied the preliminary investigation phase of nothing of the hearing, even a short one, which was also rejected without any reason”.
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