Italy needs change and investment: Maldini

“In the 1990s we had seven great teams – Milan, Inter, Juventus, Parma, Lazio, Roma, Fiorentina.”

MIAMI: Italy’s Serie A needs radical change and investment if their struggling clubs are to compete for European trophies, former AC Milan captain Paolo Maldini has told Reuters.
No Italian club has made the Champions League semi-finals since Inter Milan won the title in 2010, with Serie A leaders Juventus’ 4-0 loss on aggregate to Bayern Munich in the quarter-finals causing consternation and Maldini said it was time for the league to look at the reasons why.
“To compete with the great teams in Europe, you have to invest money, there is no other way to reach that kind of level,” said Maldini, who earned 126 caps for Italy and holds Milan’s record for most appearances.
“You could see it with Juventus against Bayern. Juventus are a great team, especially in Italy, but when you compete with a team like Bayern, you can see the difference. They need at least two or three more great players.”
Maldini won the European Cup/Champions League five times during his 25-year career with Milan and played until 2009 when he retired at the age of 41 and he looks back with nostalgia on the years when Serie A was the top league in Europe.
“In the 1990s we had seven great teams – Milan, Inter, Juventus, Parma, Lazio, Roma, Fiorentina. If you look at the players, they were great players but there was some crazy investment and some teams went bankrupt, like Parma and Lazio.
“Then you had the Moratti and Berlusconi families who put in so much money and are still surviving, it is hard though.”
Maldini, widely considered one of the great defenders in world soccer in the last 30 years, has played no role in the game since hanging up his boots although he has now taken on an ‘ambassador’ position with the upcoming International Champions Cup tournament which will be held in the US from July.
Still looking as though he could comfortably handle 90 minutes at left-back, Maldini spends some of his time each year at his Miami Beach apartment having visited during the close-season throughout his career.
As well as enjoying the relaxed rhythm of South Beach life, Maldini, whose two sons are both in Milan’s youth teams, occasionally pops to watch LeBron James and the Miami Heat in the NBA and he said Italian soccer clubs could learn a lot from the business approach to sport in the US
“We should learn from this mentality. In Italy we still have laws that don’t work.
“If you go outside the San Siro (stadium) you can see people selling fake merchandising, it was like that when I started to play and it is still like that now. You can’t allow this.

“Then you have old stadiums, very old stadiums. San Siro is a historic stadium, it’s nice but it doesn’t offer comfort …we have to improve it.
“Above all we need to learn from leagues that make money from sports rather than lose money. Everyone is losing money in Italian football, it’s crazy.”
The only benefit Maldini can see from the lack of investment in Italian teams is that it is forcing clubs to give homegrown talent a chance.
“The positive is that clubs are looking to young players.
Italy has a lot of young players that maybe deserve more space.
Milan has Mattia De Sciglio and Stephan El Shaarawy, who maybe some years ago, would have been still on the bench,” he said.
But Maldini is not going to take on the role of reforming Italian soccer, at least not for some time.
“I’m not working in football. Basically I’m a father with two kids and taking some time for myself,” he said.
“I played for 25 years and I believe I need some space for myself.
“I’m doing different things, in different businesses and enjoying life.”

Salman Butt – a fall from grace

Former Pakistani cricketer Salman Butt addresses a news conference in Lahore on April 17, 2013.

KARACHI: Salman Butt, who on Wednesday lost his appeal at the Court of Arbitration for Sport against a spot-fixing ban, was once touted as a prospect to lead Pakistan for years to come.
The stylish opener was handed the captaincy after Shahid Afridi quit following a one-sided defeat against Australia at Lords in July 2010 and took little time in changing the fortunes of the embattled team.
Pakistan defeated Australia in the very next match by four wickets at Leeds — their first win over Test cricket’s best team for 15 years — and hopes of a new era were high.
But those hopes were short-lived as a month later several Pakistani players, including Salman, became embroiled in a spot-fixing scandal.
Britain’s News of the World claimed that seven Pakistani players, including Salman, Mohammad Amir and Mohammad Asif, took money from Mazhar Majeed to obey orders at specific stages in the Lord’s Test against England.
Scotland Yard detectives raided the team hotel, reportedly confiscating a huge amount of money from Salman’s room.
The International Cricket Council (ICC) provisionally suspended the players, then banned them from cricket for – Salman for 10 years. Worse was to come as in November 2011, a British court jailed all three players and Majeed.
For many in the game Salman’s alleged involvement came as a shock but not for those who knew of his love for expensive watches and luxury cars.
After the tour of India in 2007, the ICC’s Anti-Corruption and Security Unit questioned Salman, Umar Gul and Danish Kaneria and warned them over the pitfalls involved in associating with certain businessmen.
Salman’s role again came under question during the team’s surprising defeat in the Sydney Test against Australia in January 2010 and later in the World Twenty20 held in the West Indies.
“There was no doubt about his huge talent,” said former captain Aamir Sohail, who gave Salman his first chance when chief of selectors in 2003.
“Over the years he really improved and was supposed to bring a lot to Pakistan cricket before these unfortunate events unfolded.”
Emerging from the streets of Lahore, Salman represented his country at all levels, leading Pakistan to the Asian Under-15 title in 1999 and then impressing in the Junior World Cup in 2002.
Salman’s brilliant match-winning hundred in a one-day match against India at Calcutta in late 2004 set his career on the right track and although he remained in and out of the squad, his talent was never in doubt.
Under former coach Bob Woolmer, Salman’s career flourished with hundreds at Sydney in January 2005 and another three-figure knock against Ashes-winning England at Multan.
Former captain Ramiz Raja, who had always praised Salman’s talents, was furious at seeing the captain caught up in the latest scandal.
“I felt he had the potential to play a long innings for Pakistan,” Raja told AFP.
“When you pin hopes on someone and he disappoints you then you yell out a scream.”
Salman, 28, has said that he believes he will play again but with the Swiss court having upheld the ICC ban, that now looks an unlikely prospect.

Troubled Asif faces end of career

Asif played 23 Tests and 38 one-day internationals and was regarded as one of the best new-ball bowlers in the world.

KARACHI: Pakistan paceman Mohammad Asif’s remarkable talent promised much more than he delivered.
Touted as one of the best new-ball bowlers, Asif’s career appears to have been struck a fatal blow on Wednesday after the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) rejected his appeal against a seven-year spot-fixing ban.
Along with teenage pace partner Mohammad Amir and captain Salman Butt, he was implicated in a News of the World sting, which claimed that several Pakistani players took money to perform specific orders pre-arranged with bookmakers during the Lord’s Test against England in August 2010.
In 2011 the three players were all banned by the International Cricket Council Tribunal, with Asif and Butt turning to CAS in a last-ditch attempt to get their bans voided.
Scandal is nothing new for 30-year-old Asif, whose brief five-year international career had more lows than highs.
Asif, along with another paceman Shoaib Akhtar, tested positive for a banned steroid in 2006.
He was banned for one year and Akhtar for two years, sanctions which were overturned on appeal, a decision which many felt encouraged Asif to continue flouting the rules.
He again failed a dope test in the inaugural Indian Premier League (IPL) season in 2008 and a two-year ban followed.
Asif suffered more misery when he was arrested at Dubai airport for possessing a banned drug.
He was detained for 19 days only to be deported after the police found the quantity of the substance “insufficient” to pursue a case.
Even after the ban ended, Asif’s career was hit by a scandal with South Asian film star and model Veena Malik, who alleged he owed her huge amounts of money.
And when the spot-fixing scandal broke, Veena called Asif an “eternal fixer”.
For many, Asif’s failure to act responsibly was disappointing.
“Asif has been through a lot in his life, with doping allegations and bans, but he clearly has not learned from his mistakes,” said former captain Ramiz Raja in 2011.
It was under Pakistan’s coach Bob Woolmer that Asif blossomed as a genuine swing bowler.
Woolmer picked him for Pakistan’s tour to Australia and although Asif went wicketless on his debut Test at Perth, Woolmer never lost faith in the lithe and determined fast bowler.
Asif claimed 11 wickets in a tour match against England in 2005 and was brought back into the national side for Pakistan’s final Test against India at home in 2006.
He took seven wickets in the win over India — including the prized wicket of Sachin Tendulkar — at Karachi, which also helped Pakistan clinch the series.
He followed it with 11 victims in Pakistan’s Test win at Galle, taking 17 wickets in the two Tests. His “five-for” also helped Pakistan beat South Africa in the Port Elizabeth Test in 2007.
But an elbow injury and worries over his disciplinary record forced Pakistan to withdraw him and Akhtar from the 2007 World Cup.
After he completed the IPL ban, Asif’s career seemed to be back on track until the ill-fated England tour where he grabbed 23 wickets in six Tests — two against Australia and four against the home team.