Why Italy is not located nearer the top of Europe

The good times are over. Italian soccer woke up last Friday morning to a cruel reckoning. Lazio, Inter Milan, AS Roma and Parma had all just bombed out of Europe.

For the second time in two seasons, no Italian club has made it to the quarter-finals of the UEFA Cup whilst Italy's only remaining European survivor is AC Milan in the Champions League.

It is always possible that such a full-scale whitewash can happen once, given a series of coincidental, mitigating factors. For it to happen in two consecutive seasons bodes no excuses.

Whilst Spanish soccer can claim no less than four of the eight UEFA Cup quarter- finalists, not to mention three clubs still on target in the Champions League, Italy looks to the lone spectre of the currently ailing AC Milan, thrashed 3-0 on Sunday night by Juventus.

Needless to say, the negative results of last week have prompted a positive outbreak of weeping, wailing and gnashing of teeth.

Leading the lament was sports daily Gazzetta Dello Sport, which commented angrily: "Rich, arrogant and incompetent. (Italian clubs) have failed - organisationally, technically, institutionally and as business concerns. And, please, let us not look to unfair refereeing as an excuse . . ."

Is it really so bad? Can the country which has won eight of the last 12 UEFA Cup trophies, not to mention four of the last 12 Champions League finals, suddenly have gone down the footballing spout?

Clearly, it is not quite as bad as it seems. Italian soccer boosts three clubs good enough to have gone further in Europe - namely, the three sides currently out in front in Serie A, Roma, Juventus and Lazio.

All three, however, were spectacular victims of their own complacency, with Juventus and Lazio taking much too long to warm up their engines in the Champions League and with Roma deciding that it could tackle Liverpool, while resting key players such as captain Francesco Totti and Argentine Gabriel Batistuta, (both started in Roma's 2-0 away win against Vicenza on Sunday).

Italian national team coach Giovanni Trapattoni, in Rome this week to prepare for tomorrow night's friendly against Argentina, believes Italian soccer should stop, take stock and learn from last week's events.

"It's not that we've suddenly got much worse. Rather, it's that the others have caught up on us, often modelling themselves on us. Until recently, all the best foreign players played in Italy, but that's no longer the case.

"There was a time when we had a league that was richer in technique, in sheer class and that was tactically much better organised. . . That is simply no longer the case".

Trapattoni's views command respect. Not only is he the winning-most coach in Italian soccer with seven Serie A titles to his credit, but he has also coached outside Italy, winning the Bundesliga title with Bayern Munich in 1997.

Even though he appears to take a generally benign vision of this negative moment in Italian soccer, he does admit that peculiar Italian factors take a heavy toll. "We're a Latin country, with a very special footballing environment where everything weighs heavily."

Lazio's Argentine striker Hernan Crespo, scorer of three goals in a 5-3 home win against Verona on Sunday, has no difficulty pinpointing that heavy weight. Having played for five seasons in Italy, with Lazio and Parma, Crespo should be in a position to judge.

"I think the biggest problem is fear. There is a huge fear of conceding a goal because in Italy every defeat is a tragedy."