The pre-dawn raid has become a fact of life for Italian football. The ‘Calcioscommesse’ probe into gambling-related match-fixing arrived at probably its highest profile address yet yesterday, when police searched the home of the recently retired AC Milan and Italy midfielder Gennaro ‘Rino’ Gattuso.
Prosecutors say his name, along with that of Cristian Brocchi, a former Milan colleague of Gattuso’s and until last summer a Lazio player, had been linked with an alleged match-fixing ring through intercepted phone messages.
If ever a footballer owed his popularity to the qualities of endeavour and uncompromised competitiveness, Gattuso was it.
By his own admission, his garlanded career with Milan, which yielded two Champions League titles, and with Italy, with whom he won the 2006 World Cup, was the fruit not of great technical gifts but of graft and sweat.
The very idea those values might be corruptible would shock to the core. Say it ain’t so, Rino? He firmly denied any association with match-fixing. “I am angry and offended,” Gattuso told Mediaset, the broadcaster.
“I have never gambled in my life and I am confident any investigations will clear my name.”
Central to those investigations will be the relationship between Gattuso, Brocchi and an alleged fixer, Francesco Bazzani, who was arrested yesterday.
Prosecutors claim he was in contact with the players in the period leading up to specific Serie A fixtures, involving AC Milan in the 2010-11 season when they won the title. For the sake of the sport’s credibility, a full and thorough explanation of that contact is required.
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