Italians love a good strike, so it might come as a surprise to some that Italian Serie A clubs have unanimously agreed to a court of arbitration ruling that will see the majority shut their doors to fans until new safety conditions have been met. In many cases these conditions are structural and will take a long to complete. So for the rest of the season, most Serie A games will be painfully devoid of one of the league’s hallmarks: atmosphere.
Despite the harsh ruling, the Italian teams have decided to play. “After a very lively discussion … we decided to play, to demonstrate our seriousness and our share of the responsibility for the country’s problems,” said Antonio Matarrese, the league president who represented the clubs. AC Milan vice president Adriano Galliani, whose stadium was among those closed, praised the league’s chairman: “It was a great test of maturity on the part of the (club) chairmen. There’s still a great deal of bitterness because we were not consulted by the government,” he said.
The Italian government implemented the new measures after a policeman was killed during a soccer riot in Sicily last Friday. As a result, only the Roma, Genoa, Siena, Cagliari, Turin and Palermo stadiums will be allowed to operate normally. The others will remain closed to fans, pending security improvements.