BILLY BUNTER

Weblog: The football punter

Europe is no hiding place for embarrassing Italians

THERE’S a junior league up near Telford somewhere that has decided to change all the winning scorelines of their matches to 1-0 regardless of the actual score.

It’s designed to save the embarrassment of the kids on the wrong end of a hiding.

After what happened in Italy at the weekend maybe they should give that idea a go in Serie A.

A few 1-0 scorelines would at least make the rest of the world think the Italian league is half decent.

I ask you, five 0-0 scorelines out of six Sunday afternoon games.

How pathetic is that?

And to think they once claimed they had the best league in the world.

Remember back in the day when we were supposed to jump off our mopeds, fix a nice cappuccino and a bowl of olives and gather round the box to worthily hang on James Richardson’s every word as two teams of swarthy sorts spent 90 minutes passing the ball sideways at a monotonously slow pace.

Gosh it was great!

Oh yeah, I remember.

It was pants.

It takes more than slick hair, huge banners and a dollop of Puccini to make a football league, and it’s for those reasons alone that I hope Napoli and Inter both receive a good chinning on Tuesday evening.

I’m not sure Interwill mess up at Lille but I definitely expect Bayern Munich to go to Naples and get a result.

Bayern are buzzing and I fancy them and Basel to kick off Champions League Week Three with a profit.