Dear Giampaolo Pozzo,
Let us begin by saying: thank you.
Thank you for everything you have done for Udinese. From sticking with us in the 1980s through scandal and regulation to building a brand new stadium that still incorporates our beloved arch into the renovated design.
We appreciate your scouting tactics, whether it be young players moulded into Serie A superstars or having faith in implementing innovating coaching regimes.
We are grateful that we can proudly wear Muntari, Bierhoff, Sanchez, Handanovic, among other greats, on the back of our jerseys because of you.
We are indebted to the fact you helped us become a household name, a team to be feared, a team to be respected, and a team that has the potential to be a European qualifying force.
You made us into Davids that defeated the Goliaths of Italy.
Believe us when we say we are honoured that you took our little Friulano team into a new era. You have been at the helm of the Zebrette for nearly 30 years and you have become our second father, our Pari Pupa Pozzo, and we love you.
But, we need to talk.
The above is all true, we are grateful and appreciated and proud; but we are also frustrated, annoyed, and desperate. And worse, we do not see any alleviation in the near future.
Over the past few years, we have watched players raise the profile of Udinese under your careful and gracious guidance and we have watch them become the foundation for the pillars of Udinese’s success.
We watched their success, their triumphant, and their maturity into top class players. And then we have watched them leave to carry on their glory elsewhere.
Which would be fine, if they were replaced with players of equal calibre and experience, instead of the fresh-faced, unheard-of’s that are constantly being added to our squad, with the hope and gamble that they will be the ‘next big thing’.
Only to be, once again, sold and replaced with a greenhorn standby.
The idea of Udinese as a feeder team is not working. We are supplying the players to make Europe’s biggest clubs even better, and then we struggle to compete against them.
Alexis Sanchez was sold to Barcelona for €26 million, Fabio Quagliarella to Napoli for €18 million, Mehdi Benatia to Roma for €13.5 million, Samir Handanovic to Inter for €11 million, , and, just recently, Luis Muriel could also be going to Sampdoria for a reported €10.5 million.
What have you been doing with the money? Why are you not replacing the ‘next big thing’ with a ‘current big thing’? Why don’t we see the fruits of our team’s labour, replacing what we have sowed?
Over the last few years, we have acquired a taste for glory and we like it. We deserve it. And we need an owner, a leader, a Pari Pupa who believes we deserve it too.
We have watched our little team explode worldwide; in our 118 years of existence, Udinese has never experienced such a global impact as it has in our last 10 years and we want to keep that momentum going.
Pari Pupa Pozzo, we ask you, Furlan to Furlan, to buy someone this January transfer window. A name we have heard of; a name we can be proud of, rather than become proud of. Give us someone we respect to prove you respect us.
And, please, do not immediately send him to Watford.
Buine fortune and graciis,
Your Zebrette.
Follow Sonja Missio on Twitter at: @SonjaMissio
I can understand your thought. But look around you, even Juventus and Roma can hardly compete with european teams. Italian football has been being through a critical moment. Purchases as Mario Gomez for Fiorentina reveal to be failures. Foreign clubs sell us their “name we have heard of” only when they are remains of a big club such as Bayern Monaco. Also remember a team have to pay the salaries. Trust me, it’s better Udinese builds up its own squad basing on its own academy talents(better if italians), no matter if they are not replaced promptly.
as an Empoli fan whose team sold you toto di natale, i wish your team the best for the future
To be honest I think it’s worked well for Udinese. They havent flirted with relegation in ages but have flirted with champions league a few times. I think AC Milan and Inter would bite your arm off for that kind of recent history! Pozzo doesnt wanna become a ‘big’ cos if he did he would not have invested cash in foreign clubs and could have pumped it all into Udine.
Just be happy your not like Bologna, Brescia, Lecce etc…clubs that are (or have been) similar in stature to the Zebras but are now nowhere to be seen. Udinese+Pozzo=Overachievers (but thats nothing to be ashamed of BTW).
As a Watford fan of over 50 years I can sympathise with your heartfelt plea as until the Pozzo family bought our club we too have suffered with seeing our best players sold in order to keep our club alive.
However, under our current ownership I really believe that a financial position can be established that will not only benefit Watford but also our sister clubs of Udinese and Granada.
Much has been gambled on getting our club into the Premership which has become a financial Nirvana for clubs, ad regardless of whether or not one approves of this it is a current fact of life. If this can be achieved and I think that this season it is a real possibility then I feel that all 3 clubs will reap the benefits of this in a big way over the years to come.
At Watford we have taken time to come to terms with the Pozzo way of doing things but I strongly believe all of our clubs are in safe hands an the future for all of us will be exciting.
I’ve put myself into a position as an Udinese fan for these views, to see how i’d feel if I were one of them.
I can say with 100% honesty that everything the Pozzos stand for is the way forward within Italian football. The document with every players wages in Serie A showed that De Rossi is the highest paid player in the league at just under £100k a week. There’s probably close to 20 or 30 players on that sort of money in the premier league. Serie A is in decline, it cannot offer the sort of money that the other “big” leagues can offer. As a poster above said, buying or getting big names in is no guarantee of success either.
Certainly better buying cheap talent on low wages and reaping the rewards of a higher transfer fee later on (and as the letter asked where the transfer money was going, it’s going on wages, transfer fees, the scouting network and all the other overheads that the small Italian TV right money cannot cover)
Fans love to be greedy and always want more, luckily, they often don’t get it.