This wasnÆt the way Marcello Lippi hoped to begin ItalyÆs final push before the World Cup.
The Azzurri coach faced calls for his resignation after becoming embroiled in the widening Italian soccer scandal. No one accused Lippi of doing anything wrong, other than having coached for eight years at Juventus, which is at the heart of the scandal, and being the father of Davide Lippi, who is a consultant for GEA, the soccer management agency that is also being investigated.
At the ItaliansÆ training camp in Coverciano, Guido Rossi, who was brought in as an emergency caretaker to run the Italian federation following the resignation of president Franco Carraro, gave Lippi his vote of confidence.
''I have never had any doubt about his position,ö said Rossi as the camp opened. ôIt would have been a total folly to put the blame on Lippi and avoid the people really responsible for this situation.ö
Former Juve general manager Luciano Moggi faces match-fixing allegations, Also being investigated is MoggiÆs son, Alessandro, who runs GEA.
Calls for Marcello LippiÆs resignation followed his questioning by magistrates for three and a half hours last Friday. They were quizzing him about his relationship with Luciano Moggi.
The case centers on wiretaps of Moggi seemingly try to fix Italian soccer affairs so they would favor Juve.
In several wiretaps, Lippi talks to Moggi about the national team. Some of the conversations suggest Moggi tried to pressure Lippi into leaving certain Juventus players out of national team games so that they weren't too tired for JuveÆs matches. Lippi refuted these suggestions.
''After eight years working together, is it a surprise that we spoke on the phone?ö Lippi said. ôI got calls from all the clubs, not just Juventus. But I was never put under pressure about team selection.''
By having Davide Lippi as a consultant, GEA was hoping the appearance of a link to Marcello Lippi would be seen as a way to entice players hoping to make the national team to sign with the agency — or at least make them believe they would have no future on the national team if they signed elsewhere. Marcello Lippi Among the allegations against GEA, it is accused of pressuring its players to underperform when their teams played Juventus.