Parma have had a very bad year. First, a financial crisis forced them out of the Europa League before even playing a match after they failed to secure a European competition licence with UEFA. That started the tide of a minor player exodus and a tumble down the table, and they've spent most of this Serie A campaign in dead last.
Parma sold again amid deepening financial crisis
Parma’s new owners lasted all of two months before their own financial failures forced them to sell the club.
Giuseppe Bellini/Getty Images
When their struggles worsened they stopped paying wages to their players and staff, incurring a points deduction and seeming to lead to even worse performances on the pitch. The club was finally sold to a group of Russian and Cyprian businessmen lead by Albanian oil magnate Rezart Taçi, and hope seemed to be restored ... but then the bottom fell out of the oil and gas markets, the value of the ruble crashed, wages kept not being paid, and Parma continued to be stapled to the bottom of the table.
Watching the team, the unrest was patently obvious, with players seemingly just going through the motions in some matches as they headed towards embarrassing results. Antonio Cassano and Felipe both canceled their contracts and left the club, while Gabriel Paletta forced his way in to a bargain-bin transfer exit. Despite the passionate remonstrations of manager Roberto Donadoni, it was clear that all was very much not well with Parma.
Now, with debts spiraling up to a figure reported to be as high as €86 million and an ownership in no financial position to pay it off, the club has been sold again as it teetered on the edge of administration. Taçi’s ownership group had been given a deadline of February 15th to settle its debts to Parma’s players and staff or face bankruptcy administration; it is currently unclear if that deadline has been extended as Parma’s new owners get into the club and organized, or if they will be held to the same date.
That deadline is not the only thing that’s unclear - we don’t even actually know who owns Parma yet. It’s believed that an Italian businessman named Fiorenzo Alborghetti is the face of the new ownership group, but who comprises that group is a mystery beyond vague statements of them being “Italians with foreign interests.”
Even Fabio Giordano, who helped facilitate the sale of Parma to Taçi’s group from previous owner Tomasso Ghirardi, finds the sale and the circumstances leading up to it mysterious. He claims that he had helped lay out a plan to reform Parma and had helped put that plan in to motion before leaving the club in December for health reasons.
Unless Alborghetti’s group proves to be financial angels and saves the club from its current crisis, Parma will almost certainly be forced in to some form of bankruptcy. The club would be forced to liquidate, and Parma as we currently know it would cease to exist.
That doesn’t mean all hope is lost for Parma fans. Clubs have recovered from this kind of situation. Just look at Rangers in Scotland, who have clawed their way back to the second tier of Scottish football after going bankrupt three years ago.
Perhaps a better example is fellow Italian side Napoli. Eleven years ago, the club had incured massive debt thanks to poor business practices, much like Parma are now. After S.S.C. Napoli entered administration in August 2004, movie mogul Aurelio De Laurentiis purchased the club, renamed Napoli Soccer, and the FIGC placed it into Serie C1 (now Lega Pro). Two years later, they were in Serie B, taking back the name SSC Napoli, and they won promotion back to Serie A after just one season in Italy’s second division.
Now, ten years after it seemed that the club was doomed, they’ve become one of the best clubs in Italy thanks to smart and determined ownership. The same can hold true for Parma, so long as patience and resolve win the day. Things look bleak now, but as the saying goes, it’s always darkest just before the dawn.
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