Giovanni Malago, who officiated the Milan-Cortina Winter Olympics, became the man charged with reviving Italian football on Monday after being elected head of the country’s football federation (FIGC).
The 67-year-old, as widely expected, defeated his only challenger for the post, former football chief Giancarlo Abete, who received 68.58 percent of the votes at an extraordinary general meeting held at the FIGC headquarters in Rome.
His election was little more than a formality, as he had already secured the support of Italy’s two top professional divisions, Serie A and Serie B, as well as the players’ and coaching associations, which together secured more than half of the available votes.
Malago is an experienced sports administrator and shrewd political player who presided over the birth of a golden age for Italian sport between 2013 and 2025 as head of the National Olympic Committee (CONI), the country’s top sporting body.
He takes control of the FIGC as the national sport is at its lowest ebb, falling further behind its traditional European rivals since Italy last won the World Cup 20 years ago.
Serie A was once the richest and most prestigious league in the world, but even the biggest teams – AC Milan, Inter Milan and Juventus – can no longer compete with the financial might of the English Premier League and a handful of other mega-clubs on the continent.
Last season, Atalanta were the only Italian team to reach the last 16 of the Champions League, where they were defeated 10-2 on aggregate by Bayern Munich.
Italian football entered a downward spiral in March after the men’s national team failed to qualify for the World Cup, currently being played in the United States, Canada and Mexico, for a third consecutive year.
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Malago’s predecessor Gabriele Gravina eventually resigned as FIGC chief after initially trying to remain in charge, while coach Gennaro Gattuso and team general manager Gianluigi Buffon also resigned after being eliminated in the qualifying play-offs by Bosnia-Herzegovina.
That defeat on penalties will be all the more painful for the Italian fans who saw Bosnia defeated 4-1 by Switzerland on Thursday.
As well as appointing a new national coach – widely known as Roberto Mancini – Malago will have to fulfill a long-standing desire for reform within the FIGC and lead the Italian leg of Euro 2032, which is being co-hosted with Turkey.
In April, UEFA chief Aleksander Ceferin told Gazzetta dello Sport that Italy could lose the tournament due to the condition of the country’s football stadiums, which he called «among the worst in Europe».
One of the most important tasks facing Malago is reforming youth development in a country that was once a conveyor belt of football talent, but whose current player is Manchester City goalkeeper Gianluigi Donnarumma.
Not long before the disaster in Bosnia and the subsequent wave of resignations, the FIGC announced a new youth football project in which two heroes of the 2006 World Cup victory, Simone Perrotta and Gianluca Zambrotta, play a key role.
While the senior national team has often been a source of national embarrassment, Italy’s under-17s were crowned European champions for the second time in three years earlier this month.
Published on June 22, 2026
