Milan President Scaroni: ‘Serie A with 18 teams is inevitable’

Milan President Paolo Scaroni believes it is ‘inevitable’ that Serie A will be reduced to 18 teams, a view shared by Inter and Juventus. ‘We must limit the number of games played to safeguard players and clubs.’

The plan was proposed by the Federation (FIGC) with support from the three biggest clubs in Italy, but rejected by the rest of the Lega Serie A last week.

Nonetheless, Scaroni remains confident that it is only a matter of time before Serie A is cut down from 20 clubs to 18.

“It is all about the number of games that we play,” the Milan chief told reporters ahead of a UEFA lunch for tonight’s Europa League play-off against Rennes.

“We must limit the number of games played to safeguard the health of the players, who are also the assets of the club. Seeing as international competitions keep growing, both for FIFA and the Champions League, if at the end of the day we put together all the fixtures between cup competitions, domestic and international tournaments, there are too many games.

“Personally, I feel that this reduction is an inevitable path, it will happen because it has to happen. I also do not forget that Italian football had its greatest moment when Serie A had 18 teams.”

The Italian top flight had 18 clubs for many years until expanding to 20 in the 2004-05 campaign.

That was not a strategic decision, but one made in an emergency to avoid legal action from Catania, who were suing over relegation and promotion over a confusing lack of clarity on whether certain players had sat out bans or not.

It resulted in Serie B expanding to 24 teams in 2002-03 and in a knock-on effect Serie A moved to 20 a year later, Serie B dropping to 22.