Dodgy IV Drips, Mafia Break-Ins & Match-Fixing – Former Argentina International Matias Almeyda Lifts Lid On Italian Football

Chris Wright

26th, September 2012

10 Comments

By Chris Wright

Former Argentina international Matias Almeyda has written an autobiography which is currently being serialised in Gazzetta dello Sport, in which the midfielder – who is currently head coach at River Plate – makes some fairly scandalous claims about the state of the inner machinations of Italian football, including intravenous doping, pandemic match-fixing and mafia intimidation.

Almeyda spent eight years in Italy, wherein he turned out for Lazio, Parma, Brescia and Inter Milan.

In the interest of laziness on our part, here’s the direct copy+paste quote from the passage of ‘Almeyda: Life and Soul’ which features in the lastest issue of La Gazzetta dello Sport, as transcribed by ESPN:

Speaking of his time with Parma, he talks about being given what he now believes were drugs – a story reinforced by television footage of Fabio Cannavaro taking on intravenous fluids the night before a match.

“At Parma we were given an IV drip before games,” he wrote. “They said it was a mixture of vitamins but before entering the field I was able to jump up as high as the ceiling. Players do not ask questions, but then in the following years there are cases of former players dying from heart problems, suffering from muscular issues and more. I think it is the consequence of the things that have been given to them.”

Almeyda also writes openly on his battle with alcohol during his time at Inter Milan, when his career was winding down.

“Once in Azul, my country, I drank five litres of wine, like Coca Cola, and I ended up in some kind of coma,” he wrote. “To try to get it out of my system I ran five kilometres until I saw the sun spinning. A doctor gave me five hours of infusion and it would have been a scandal as at the time I was playing for Inter. When I woke up I saw my whole family around the bed and I thought it was my funeral.”

On his earlier spell with Parma, he wrote of a disagreement with the former president and owner Stefano Tanzi and tells of men breaking into his home – an incident he claims was repeated when former team-mate Savo Milosevic had a similar argument with the club.

“I had a fight with Stefano Tanzi and several days later I woke up to find my new car was missing from the garage,” he wrote. “Milosevic was also in conflict with the club with a contract as high as mine and the same thing happened.

“One day my wife comes home and hears voices inside. She ran away and called the police. There was a message on the wall, made with machine oil, a message from the mafia. My wife had a premature birth. Following the 2002 World Cup I’ve never been back to Parma.”

He describes events from a match in 2001 when Parma lost 3-1 to Roma, who pipped Juventus to the Scudetto due to that result.

“Some companions in Parma told us that the Roma players wanted us to lose the game,” he wrote. “I said no and the majority responded that way, but on the field I saw that some did not run as usual so I asked to be substituted and went in the locker room. Money? I do not know, they called it a favour…”

So, in short, it’s absolutely nothing you’ve not heard before vis-a-vis the Italian game!

Posted in FAIL, Serie A

Share this article: Email

10 Comments

  1. Stefano says:

    “So, in short, it’s absolutely nothing you’ve not heard before vis-a-vis the Italian game!”

    You can substitute any and all nations in for “Italian” there now. Don’t be so naive to think that your English league isn’t rife with cheating.

    Or maybe you don’t cheat at all. But that would be why you haven’t won jack shit for 40+ years…

  2. Fnarf says:

    I’m not saying his mafia stories aren’t true, but it’s possible that an alternate explanation exists for why a guy who drinks five liters of wine doesn’t know where his car is.

  3. Itwillbeok says:

    Stefano, you need to talk? I’m here for you. Anytime you need to talk. Just let me know. Ok? K.

  4. Al says:

    @ Stefano – It is ludicrous to suggest that the English league is anything like the Italian one when it comes to cheating. What evidence are you basing that on? The Italian league has been rocked over and over again with match fixing scandals whereas the English league plainly hasn’t.
    I’m also not sure I understand how cheating and fixing games in their domestic league has helped Italy to win the World Cup a few times, by your rational if England start fixing games they are nailed on to win in Brazil 2014? Absolute horse shit

  5. Haywired says:

    @Stefano
    As both you and the article are referring to the domestic leagues here rather than international football, then I don’t get the last line. English clubs from the English league have won a hell of a lot in the last 40+ years (12 European Cup/Champions League winners for example, same as Italy).

  6. JT says:

    @Stefano, Has the truth touched a nerve mate? lol

  7. kg says:

    so whats new in these claims that we haven’t heard before?

  8. Lanza says:

    Typical premier league media bias coming through again in the comments section. The footballing world could only hope to become the utopia that the premier league is. Right.

  9. Giancarlo Marcelli says:

    I’m Italian and I know the entire country is corrupt, so it’s not surprising that football in Italy is corrupt as well besides the fact that this isn’t the first person saying these things, and all the scandals. You know how you better your reputation? Better your actions. Italians will do anything to win, and get paid, apparently drugging a man like a racehorse is okay.

  10. Mark Miami says:

    Plenty of EPL match rigging, ever watch the refs at a United game?

Leave a Reply