Team Talk : Secco

Juve To Sack Secco & Replace With Marino?
19/02/2008 18:20

Juventus are hoping to replace transfer director Alessio Secco with Napoli’s Pierpaolo Marino, according to a number of reports in Italy.


Both Tuttosport and Il Mattino say that the Bianconeri hierarchy have reached the end of their tether with Secco following a long-line of calamitous transfer dealings.

Secco has become notorious for his expensive purchases of the likes of Jean-Alain Boumsong, Sergio Almiron and Tiago Mendes, who joined the club for a total fee of around €27m.

He has also been criticized for attempting to offload Giorgio Chiellini last summer to Manchester City, as well as for leaving Juve short of numbers in defence last month, after sending a number of players on loan without finding replacements.

It is expected that Secco will be relieved of his duties in the summer, and as his replacement Juventus would like to employ Napoli general manager Pierpaolo Marino.

Marino has been admired by Juve for quite sometime, and he did his reputation no harm last summer after a string of impressive signings for Napoli, including Marek Hamsik, Ezequiel Lavezzi and Walter Gargano.

Marino was at Napoli as sporting director during their Diego Maradona glory days of the 1980s.

His return to the club in 2004 has coincided with Napoli’s rise back to Serie A following years in the wilderness.

His impressive C.V also includes a spell at Udinese when the club boasted the likes of Oliver Bierhoff, Amoroso and Paulo Poggi in their line-up, finishing third in 1997/98, and in the top-six on another four occasions between 1996 and 2004.

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