A referee scandal has shaken Italian football: Gianluca Rocchi, head of referees in the Serie A and Serie B, the man in charge of assigning referees to football matches in the first divisions of Italian football, has suspended himself after being investigated and accused of "complicity in sporting fraud".
The Italian Referees Association (AIA) confirmed that Rocchi had suspended himself due to the investigation, that accuses him, also a former international referee, of assigning referees that were allegedly favourable to Inter Milan.
According to AS, the first incident happened on April 20, 2025, when he allegedly manipulated the designation of referee Andrea Colombo for a Bologna-Inter match, a referee that was "preferred" by Inter, the visiting team (Inter ended up losing the match and also the league that season).
He is also accused of choosing referee Daniele Doveri for the Coppa Italia semi-final between Inter and Milan on April 23, 2025, so he wouldn't be chosen for the final; AC Milan won the semi-final. A third accusation into Rocchi includes influencing the VAR assistant during a Udinese-Parma match, in order to award a penalty to Udinese, despite objections by the VAR assistant of the match.
Inter Milan reacted to the news saying they are "stunned by the declarations", that they learned about it on the media, and that they are confident that they have acted entirely fairly. "We do not have referees that we favour or are unfavourable toward. "We are safe in the knowledge that Inter are not involved in this situation and will not be involved in the future", the club said, via Reuters.
Gianluca Rocchi is scheduled for a preliminary hearing on April 30. He said the decision to suspend himself was "painful, difficult but shared with my family", and trusts that legal proceedings will run their course properly, "from which I am sure I will come out unscathed and stronger than before".