The Nazionale would have done well without this controversy to prepare for its decisive matches against Malta on Saturday then England on Tuesday, in qualifying for Euro 2024. On Thursday, the gathering of the Italian selection was disrupted by the arrival of police officers who came to question two players, Sandro Tonali and Nicolo Zaniolo, in an investigation into illicit sports betting.
At around 6:00 p.m. on Thursday, just as the training session had just ended, investigators in plain clothes showed up at the gates of the Coverciano national center, near Florence. Mandated by the Turin public prosecutor’s office, they notified midfielders Sandro Tonali and Nicolo Zaniolo that they are the subject of an investigation into illicit sports betting.
Accompanied by Gianluigi Buffon, who became head of the Italian delegation, the two Nazionale hopefuls (23 and 24 years old) were taken to a room in the training center, where they were questioned for two hours. The two players are suspected of having used clandestine sports betting platforms, which is prohibited by article 24 of the FIGC sports justice code. One of them even bet on his team meeting in a match where he was a substitute.
Both players left the selection
Their cell phones and a tablet were seized. At the end of this hearing, Tonali, who moved from AC Milan to Newcastle this summer, and Zaniolo, who joined Aston Villa in July from Galatasaray, left the gathering. “The two players are not in a condition to face the commitments of the coming days,” explained the Italian Football Federation (FIGC) in a press release.
“It was a difficult night,” admitted coach Luciano Spalletti on the Sky Sport television channel. “There is a lot of bitterness within the team, because everyone likes these two players […] Justice must do its job. » By agreeing to come out of his sabbatical leave to succeed Roberto Mancini in August, the former Napoli coach had prepared himself for many scenarios, but probably not this one. He is now deprived of two important players, while the Nazionale, title holder, is far from being assured of competing in the next Euro. It has seven points, as many as Ukraine and North Macedonia (with one game in hand).
Fagioli, other player concerned
The affair began on Wednesday when the FIGC announced that it had opened an investigation in August against Nicolo Fagioli, a 21-year-old great prospect and selected once for the Italian team. The Juventus player is also suspected of having made bets on clandestine platforms, which exposes him to a three-year suspension and a fine of 25,000 euros.
His lawyers revealed that he himself came forward to the authorities, “in the interests of maximum transparency and cooperation with the sporting and ordinary justice systems”. In reality, he had no other choice, because his name had been circulating for several days on social networks since the revelations of the sulphurous Fabrizio Corona.
The former “king of the paparazzi”, who has just spent ten years in prison for extortion, notably to the detriment of ex-French player David Trézéguet, distils information on the addiction of certain players to sports betting. “Fagioli is not the only one,” he warned, other Serie A players are concerned, including one from AS Roma whose name he will reveal this Friday.
In a country marked by the scandals which regularly shake up calcio, notably that of the Totonero for sports betting which in 1980 caused AC Milan to be demoted to Serie B, these revelations worry even the Minister of Sports, Andrea Abodi. “Gaming addiction is not just a football problem, it is a social pathology,” he warned.
