Fans of four top soccer clubs, including champions Juventus, are awaiting Thursday's opening of the sporting trial into Serie A's biggest-ever scandal with trepidation.
Juventus, Lazio and Fiorentina may be relegated if an Italian Soccer Federation (FIGC) tribunal finds them guilty of involvement in an alleged match-fixing ring. Juventus could be stripped of the 2005 and 2006 domestic titles too.
AC Milan, which faces less serious charges, could be deducted points at the start of the next Serie A season and lose its place in the European Champions League. Juventus is in hottest water because its former general manager, Luciano Moggi, is the alleged ringleader of a network set up to steer matches in some clubs' favour.
Moggi heads the list of 26 referees, officials and club managers accused of misconduct, along with Juve's ex-CEO Antonio
Giraudo.
In return for favours on the pitch, Moggi and Giraudo stand accused of wining and dining refs and giving them half-price deals for cars made by Fiat, the Turin auto maker controlled by Juve's owner the Agnelli Group. Individuals found guilty at the tribunal, which will be held at Rome's Olympic Stadium, face the prospect of being banned from the game.
Moggi appeared on Italian television Tuesday evening to claim he was being made a scapegoat for the ills of Italian soccer.
He said all he had ever done was defend Juventus from other dark powers within the sport.
Moggi's lawyers are expected to argue that the FIGC tribunal has no jurisdiction over the former manager, because he has resigned from Juventus and is no longer part of the soccer world. FIGC Prosecutor Stefano Palazzi's charge sheet also
includes Fiorentina owner Andrea Della Valle, owner of footwear giant Tod's, his brother Diego, the club chairman, and Lazio
Chairman Claudio Lotito.
Three ex-FIGC officials, including former president Franco Carraro, the former head of the referees association, two former referee appointers, eight referees and two linesmen have been charged too.
The clubs and individuals are accused of violations of fairness and probity and sporting fraud, according to articles 1 and 6 of FIGC's regulations. The FIGC tribunal is expected to issue its rulings by July 9.
Appeals should be heard before July 20, so the whole sporting disciplinary process can be wrapped up before UEFA conducts the draws for next season's European club competitions.
The best-known referee in the scandal is Massimo De Santis, who is alleged to have helped Moggi influence refs. De Santis was one of two Italian refs chosen for the World Cup but he was forced to pull out after the scandal spread thanks to police wiretaps leaked to the Italian press.
One referee, Gianluca Paparesta, is up before the tribunal because he failed to report a post-match incident in which Moggi allegedly left him locked him up in a changing room.
Four separate criminal probes into the scandal are expected to take much longer. State prosecutors are looking at different elements of the alleged web of corruption, which also extends to illegal betting, false accounting, doping and transfer fraud.
On Wednesday prosecutors spoke to Juventus coach Fabio Capello as part of their investigation into the activities of GEA World, a players' agency run by Moggi's son Alessandro. GEA is suspected of being one of the 'tools' through which Moggi controlled the Italian soccer world. Capello is not under investigation.
The so-called Moggi-gate scandal is the biggest to hit the sport since a 1980 betting case in which Paolo Rossi - later Italy's 1982 World Cup hero - was among the players banned.
