Massimo Ferrero stepped down as the President of Italian club Sampdoria after he was arrested for alleged financial crimes, which led to the club heading into bankruptcy. He was taken to San Vittore Jail in Milan and the court has ordered for the arrest of six more people, which includes his grandson and granddaughter, who have been involved with the club in some capacity.
The club have been in severe financial troubles for a long time, and despite the club making great progress under the tenure of Ferrero, becoming a Serie A regular and also achieving Europa League qualification in 2015, the financial turmoil had intensified. The 70-year-old has also been charged for leading four other companies in hotel, tourism and others into bankruptcy.
The Serie A bat, who recently dismissed their manager Claudio Ranieri, had released a statement announcing that the club is not under investigation and the president will be stepping down after his arrest was confirmed.
“It was with great astonishment that we learned of the execution today of a pre-trial detention order against Massimo Ferrero.
It was a request from the public prosecutor’s office of Paola for bankruptcy related to events of many years ago.
It is still unclear why the precautionary requirements were needed. In any case, it should be pointed out that these events are completely unrelated to the management and ownership of Sampdoria and Ferrero’s activities relating to the world of cinema.”
the statement read.
Ferrero has been close to selling the club for a while, and a notable consortium involving club legend Gianluca Vialli came close to making the purchase, but the deal hasn’t gone through as yet. He had expressed earlier this week that he is willing to sell the club if a suitable buyer comes along.
Sampdoria are currently 15th on the Serie A table and suffered a 3-1 defeat to Lazio at home despite the visiting team getting reduced to 10 men. Roberto D’Aversa is currently in charge of the managerial duties and registered a couple of morale-boosting wins against Salernitana (2-1) and Verona (3-1), before losing to Fiorentina (3-1).
