“The President of the Lega Nazionale Professionisti Serie A, having seen the resolution of the League Council, in which the Lega Serie A takes note of the Ordinance of the Mayor of Bologna n. 761919/2024, which does not allow disputes, even behind closed doors, of the Serie A championship match Enilive Bologna-Milan, scheduled for 26 October 2024 at 6.00 pm, orders the postponement of the same to a date to be set”. In summary, Bologna-Milan will not be played this weekend. The official press release from the League effectively closed an exciting day from every point of view and which ended not without twists and turns.
After the order, also confirmed yesterday after a meeting with the Prefect, of the mayor of Bologna, Matteo Lepore, to close the Dall’Ara stadium due to rain forecasts and for the activities to restore the situation in the Porto-Saragozza district (which hosts stadium and which was the one most affected by the flood on Saturday evening), the League itself had tried to find an alternative venue for the match. An emergency board of directors was called to address the issue, which ended around 1.30pm to make room for the meeting and resumed at 2.45pm to reach a conclusion. After various hypotheses of a neutral field (Como, Verona, Empoli), in the end the referral line, for which Bologna worked. Milan, on the other hand, would have liked to play.
Here are all the reactions from the parties involved, namely Bologna, Milan and Lega Serie A
Claudio Fenucci, CEO of Bologna: “There is an objective situation of difficulty in the stadium area, where there have also been collapses. So beyond the solidarity that we continue to express towards the families, there were also objective situations that made the dispute over the match in Bologna. I therefore believe that the postponement is the right choice, the wisest one, which will allow us to safeguard the proceeds of the match, given that part of it will be dedicated to the flood victims. What was Milan’s position? These are organizational issues that need to be addressed defending the interests of the parties. I believe playing matches behind closed doors and without an audience is always a defeat for the movement.”
Paolo Scaroni, president of Milan: “An incomprehensible decision, Mayor Lepore has banned the match behind closed doors. I don’t understand why but in the face of the Mayor’s order we lower our heads.”
Lorenzo Casini, president of Lega Serie A: “We were surprised by the mayor’s ordinance, for two reasons. Generally these decisions are taken by the prefect, which came from the mayor surprised us. Above all, a dialogue has opened because, if you have read the ordinance, the assumption is the presence of 35 thousand people at the stadium. An attempt was made to speak with the mayor to be able to play behind closed doors, but there was no willingness from the municipality on this: the choice became whether to impose a neutral pitch 24 hours away, imposing it on the two teams, or whether to respect the order of an authority recognized by law and postpone the match. Can it create a dangerous precedent? Well, then… no protection of the regularity of the championship. What is certain is that in the future we will all have to be attentive and evaluate every possible alternative, for us closed doors could have been practicable: it is also true that the situation in the region, and in particular in Bologna, is was particularly difficult. Why not the neutral field? It is not foreseen by the system, in the face of an administrative act that prevents reaching the plant for public safety. That’s not to say it can’t be done, it needs to be evaluated in the future. There is a series of decisions that risked being a series of complications. Would Bologna and Milan have agreed? Milan had given availability, for Bologna it would have been complicated.”