Italian Soccer Suspended

PALERMO, February 5: Italian soccer, including Serie A games
and this week’s scheduled friendly against Romania, has been indefinitely
suspended following the death of a policeman Friday after a riot broke out at
the Catania vs. Palermo match.

According to wire reports, clashes broke out between
policemen and fans during the match involving the two Serie A clubs. Filippo
Raciti was killed after an explosive was tossed into his car by one of the
rioters at the match. About 100 people, including police officers and match
attendees, were injured during the melee. The Italian football federation,
FIGC, promptly suspended all domestic and international matches on Friday. “We
can't continue to go on like this," FIGC's extraordinary commissioner,
Luca Pancalli, is quoted as saying in a Reuters report. "Italian soccer
will stop. And it will stop until we identify a road, serious and drastic, to
allow the possibility of resuming the championships."

An emergency meeting of the FIGC board was scheduled to take
place today to come up with a plan of action to address the problem. The
suspension came just a week after an official of the Sammartinese amateur
league club died after being caught up in a fight at the end of the match.

This is more than just a blow to the pride of the nation
home to last year’s World Cup winners—revenues from Italian soccer
matches generate about 6 billion euros a year for the country.