FIGC President Gravina Spells Out Staggering Losses Caused by COVID

The balance sheets of Serie A teams are languishing due to the negative impact of the Coronavirus pandemic, the head of FIGC (the Italian Football Association) Gabriele Gravina lamented, indicating that the whole football industry lost €600M in the last two seasons.

Gravina, who is expected to be re-elected in the upcoming assembly, spoke at the Riparte l’Italia think tank: “The shortfall for the 2019/2020 campaign amounts to €200M for the top league alone, mostly related to the fact that stadiums were closed to the public and to the stoppage between May and March. For the 2020/2021 one, instead, the revenue will go down by €400M for Serie A sides. Moreover, you have to factor in that amateur and youth leagues have mostly been shut down in the past year.”

The president added that the sums have been “recalculated and reduced, but the system is going through a deep crisis in these last few months because the usual sources of profits, such as ticket sales, TV rights and sponsorships, have dried up.”

He laid out his plans to try to get out of the tough situation: “We have to intervene on youth academies, change the structure of the divisions and stimulate projects to renovate or build new arenas. Moreover, we need the industry to be more sustainable and improve the teams’ ability of generating income, for instance through betting. We should also introduce some instruments to make the management of resources more balanced for instance by setting a budget for the transfer market or introducing a salary cap to help clubs determine how much they can spend.”

While Gravina explained the platform for his re-election, he is also sending a message to the new cabinet led by Mario Draghi, hoping that football will get some help from the state, something that the previous government was not keen on providing.