Adding to the final weekend’s turmoil, Serie A was hit hard by the Italian Open men’s tennis final, which was held at the same venue as the Rome derby.
Published May 14, 2026
Italian football faces another humiliation: missing out on the World Cup for the third year in a row.
There are only three days left until the start of the penultimate round of Serie A, Italy’s top league, but half of the teams do not know when their games will be played.
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The Rome derby is at the heart of the matter, as it was originally scheduled to kick off at 12:30pm (10:30 GMT) on Sunday, along with four other matches involving teams competing for Champions League qualification.
The competition for the last three spots in the Champions League behind newly crowned champions Inter Milan is so intense that matches involving Napoli, Juventus, AC Milan, Roma and Como must all be played at the same time to ensure fairness.
However, the Italian Open men’s singles tennis final was scheduled for 5pm (5pm GST) at Rome’s Foro Italico, in the same complex as the Stadio Olimpico, and local authorities ordered the derby to be moved to Monday night due to public safety concerns.
Due to the potential for disruption to the thousands of fans of the 10 participating teams, Lega Serie A has proposed an alternative plan. It was to kick off at 12:00pm (10:00 GMT) and delay the start of the tennis to 5:30pm (15:30 GMT).
This was rejected by the authorities in Rome, so the Italian league’s governing body lodged a formal appeal with the Regional Administrative Court (TAR) on Wednesday night.
Asked about the incident on Wednesday after his team lost to Inter in the Italian Cup final, Lazio coach Maurizio Sarri blamed Lega Serie A, adding that he would not even come to the stadium if the derby was played on Sunday.
Lega Serie A president Ezio Simonelli said: “We could have considered this overlap, but at the time elements such as five games being held at the same time and Lazio’s Italian Cup final were missing.” “It’s certainly not going to happen again.
“Out of a sense of responsibility to the 300,000 fans involved, we have proposed a solution. We can assure you that moving the game forward by 30 minutes is not normal. We are asking the players and the team to make sacrifices.”
There is a five-point difference between second-place Napoli and sixth-place Como. Napoli have 70 points, Juventus on 68, Milan and Roma on 67 and Como on 65.
Napoli will visit Pisa, who are already relegated, while Juventus, Milan and Como will face Fiorentina, Genoa and Parma respectively, all three teams already in danger of being relegated.
Lazio are out of the race for a European berth.
At the other end of the table, Lecce, who are safely at the bottom of the table, will play Sassuolo, one point ahead of Cremonese in 18th place. Cremonese travels to Udinese.
The Italian national team lost to Bosnia and Herzegovina in the playoffs on March 31, becoming the first former champion country to miss out on qualifying for the World Cup finals for the third consecutive year.
The defeat has prompted calls for far-reaching changes to the structure and way Italian football is run, with Italy’s sports minister calling for the president of the soccer federation to resign.
