🥱Serie A, 0-0 problem! It’s a record, is our football boring? The fix... 👀 | OneFootball

Serie A has a problem, and its name is boredom. Last night’s 0-0 at the Meazza, in what was supposed to be the headline match of the 34th round, instead turned into the worst possible advertisement for Italian football, in a weekend when the spotlight was already on our league for a far less noble reason: the investigation into the work of referees’ chief Gianluca Rocchi.

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A point that moves Milan and Juve up the table, but one that disappointed the San Siro crowd, who at the final whistle did not spare either side from boos. The numbers on chances created speak clearly: 0.65xG for the Rossoneri against 0.52xG for the Bianconeri. Little, far too little.

The one between Allegri and Spalletti, however, was not an isolated case. In the reverse fixture, in fact, Juve-Milan had also ended goalless, with the only difference being that back then Igor Tudor was sitting on the Old Lady’s bench. Sticking with yesterday, the Meazza clash was the third goalless draw of the round, after Hellas-Lecce and Fiorentina-Sassuolo. Again, not exactly the best way to promote the product.

🫣 A record number of 0-0s!

The tally of 0-0 draws has now risen to 30 in Serie A, an extremely high number. Across Europe’s top five leagues, no one can keep up with us. The Premier League is on 23, Ligue 1 on 18, La Liga on 13, and the Bundesliga, finally, has just 12 goalless matches.

With two more matches still to be played tonight, there is a risk the season record could be matched or even broken, considering that in Matchday 7 there were as many as four 0-0 draws and only eleven goals in total.

Leading this special table is Parma, who have finished a match without conceding or scoring as many as 6 times. Then come Verona and Cremonese on 5, and the group made up of Como, Lazio, Genoa, Pisa, Fiorentina and Lecce on 4.

🤔 The solution from... Serie B?

Looking at the teams involved, it becomes clear how many of these 0-0s are driven by fear or a lack of motivation. So why not take a cue from Serie B, one of the most unpredictable and exciting leagues in the world?

Thanks to the playoffs and playouts, in fact, there is currently not a single club without a goal to fight for. The promotion race is one of the best ever, with three teams battling for two spots with just 180 minutes left. There is also a dogfight in the playoff zone, where aside from Palermo and Catanzaro, certain of finishing 4th and 5th respectively, everyone from 6th-placed Modena to 10th-placed Carrarese can still dream.

At the bottom, finally, nobody is safe, not even 14th-placed Padova who, with a difficult chain of results, could slip from 14th to 18th, which would mean relegation.

⏳ No more time should be wasted

In short, something should also be rethought when it comes to Serie A. Perhaps by introducing a playout, which would already halve the number of “safe” teams and therefore teams with no motivation left. The same system would probably be complicated for the Scudetto and Champions League places, but a solution for the spots that lead to European competition could also come from introducing a playoff for, for example, the Conference League. 

For now, it is just an idea. With the FIGC without a president, the national team out of the World Cup and without a head coach, and the chaos surrounding the investigation into the work of the referees’ chief, the Serie A format is probably not the priority right now. It seems clear, however, that sooner or later things will have to change, one way or another. Our football has already lost too much time and, above all, appeal.

This article was translated into English by Artificial Intelligence. You can read the original version in 🇮🇹 here.

📸 STEFANO RELLANDINI - AFP or licensors