Win Or Bust For Lippi, Claims Juve Supremo
Friday 15th March 2002
Juventus managing director Luciano Moggi has heaped pressure on coach Marcello Lippi by stating that failure to win Serie A or the Coppa Italia could result in the axe.
"If he is not our coach next year, it will mean we have missed out on all our objectives," he said. "I repeat that I consider our season has been very good up until now, but we'll see what happens during the run-in."
Tuesday's Champions' League defeat by Bayer Leverkusen heralded the end of Juve's Champions' League hopes and Lippi's future now rests on beating title rivals Roma and Internazionale to the Scudetto - and Parma in the Coppa Italia final on May 11.
Juve, who trail the joint leaders by a point in Serie A, saw their chances of claiming their first title since 1998 hit last week when Clarence Seedorf fired a dramatic late equaliser to earn Inter a 2-2 draw at the San Siro.
Moggi, however, played down the significance of his side's elimination from the Champions' League. "I don't want to say that was a disaster. We're still fighting to achieve our other two objectives this season.
"We have reached the Coppa Italia final and we're one point off the top of Serie A. I will wait until the end of the season before judging it. In the Champions' League we paid the price for having so many injuries.
"We played the crucial match at Leverkusen without Marcelo Salas, Alex Del Piero, Lilian Thuram and Paolo Montero. We did what we could."
Moggi added that he did not believe he had made a mistake in not adding to the squad during the transfer window in January.
"We can't see injuries like that in advance and I always have to manage our budget," he said. "We don't want to risk going bankrupt, as has happened to other Italian teams."
It is not the first time this season that the Juve hierarchy have warned Lippi of the price of failure following their �80 million summer spending spree.
In January, owner Umberto Agnelli ruled out any more major signings and warned Lippi that he should make better use of the players available to him.
"I can't say I'm happy with the first half of the season, but that does not mean we need more players," he said.
