Parma’s five-point deduction for the upcoming Serie A season has been overturned after a successful appeal on Thursday.
The promoted club were hit with the penalty after an investigation into an alleged match-fixing attempt last season led to them being found guilty of inappropriate behaviour by the Italian FA’s (FIGC) sports court.
They maintained their innocence, however, and on Thursday the FIGC’s appeals court ruled in their favour, overturning the original sentence and instead inflicting a €20,000 fine on the Emilia-Romagna club.
Striker Emanuele Calaio, who had been banned for two years after his WhatsApp messages to Spezia players had been considered an attempt to influence the outcome of their fixture at the end of last season, has also seen his ban reduced.
Calaio will now only be ineligible to play for Parma up to the end of 2018, while he has been ordered to pay a €30,000 fine.
“For two months, we have read, heard and had to sit in silence while directors of other clubs tried to climb all over the mud they were throwing at us for their personal gain,” said Pietro Pizzarotti, who represented the club during their appeal, in a statement on parmacalcio1913.com. “We are now pleased that justice has been done.”
Parma host Udinese on Aug. 19 in their first fixture back in Serie A since being declared bankrupt in 2015.
They have returned to the top flight following three straight promotions from the fourth tier of Italian football, where they started out again under their new and current guise of Parma Calcio 1913.
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