TMW
During the sixth edition of ‘Sport Talk Industry’, an event taking place this morning in the capital, Inter president Beppe Marotta spoke online to analyze the state of Italian football: “Today there is a lot of talk about sustainability, it is normal for this to be the case because in the evolution of football we have gone from a patronage that lasted up to the properties of Moratti and Berlusconi to foreign funds. Now the search for sustainability is the first objective: we must enhance resources and contain costs, we are trying to do this. For us it is the reference model, we are doing it by always trying to be competitive because the sporting aspect is what drives everything else. Oaktree is supporting us, we have developed a greater force than to the past within the structures. We have precise roles and delegations, I am very satisfied for me having become president means touching the sky, I do it with the conviction of being able to give great satisfaction to our fans”.
On the stadium issue, this is Marotta’s thoughts: “I have not followed the stadium issue concretely, Antonello has dealt with it for many years. As president I cannot back down, I agree with Scaroni’s words. Today the stadium represents important aspects for enhancing the sense of belonging of a club, it is the home of a club and it is a place of aggregation. Football is a phenomenon of strong aggregation and inside the stadium there are tens and tens of thousands of people, Inter and Milan travel with 70 thousand people on average every match the stadium does not is a cathedral in the desert used only once a week, but a daily place to frequent as well as a very important economic asset Oaktree as Elliott and RedBird have understood the importance of the stadium, it is right to try to reach a conclusion. Italy brings up the rear in terms of the quality of its structures, this is a priority and necessary requirement to ensure that every club can have continuity and allow the fans to experience an environment that they can fully feel is theirs.”
Marotta then made an appeal to the world of politics: “There is little consideration of politics towards football. Football is a social phenomenon that stands on its own, we are major taxpayers of the state, we guarantee about a billion a year while everyone thinks that we take contributions from the state. We pay all types of taxes that exist, we want the legislator to favor our development of sustainability. The presidents who are patrons or commonly defined as rich idiots are no longer there. Now there are companies that want to enter the world of football but not go into default we ask for contributions, just greater consideration. We want a more streamlined law for stadiums, the dignity decree has removed any betting sponsorship and penalizes us, the growth decree has been taken away from us while the world of work in other categories takes advantage of it. Minister Abodi is working hard but it is needed more, we want greater consideration. I’m not saying more dialogue because there is a good relationship with the current government, but perhaps there is a need for a framework law specifically on sport. Today we are in a context of strong contentiousness in the world of football, individualism is too accentuated and this contentiousness emerges in the media between the League and the Federation, but we must work through politics to have different laws. The Federation only has to protect us, the rest must be done with the institutions.”