Milan prosecutors have dismissed a sports fraud case against Gianluca Rocchi, the former head of referees for Serie A and Serie B, and his deputy Andrea Gervasoni.
The Milan Public Prosecutor’s Office stated on Wednesday it found "no evidence of a structured system aimed at interfering with appointments."
Rocchi had been accused of incidents during the 2024-25 season, including allegedly changing an official for an Inter Milan match to one more favourable to the club. Further allegations centred on Rocchi interfering with VAR protocols during a Serie A fixture between Udinese and Parma on 1 March 2025. Rocchi was also accused of pressuring a VAR official to encourage a referee to check on the pitchside monitor for a handball offence during Udinese's 1-0 win over Parma in March last year. The referee and VAR official had already decided not to award a penalty but changed their minds, it is claimed, leading to Florian Thauvin scoring the only goal of the game.
The statement released by the prosecutor explains why there was insufficient cause to continue with the extremely serious charges. “Within the limits of the available evidence, including wiretaps, tracking, and witness statements, we identified interference and pressure in only a few of the cases involving referee designations at the centre of this investigation. “However, based on the conversations intercepted between Rocchi and others, the evidence does not demonstrate that this interference and pressure was objectively aimed at altering the outcome of matches.” “Therefore, no structured system emerged to influence the fairness of the matches, nor any director or intercepted contact between the refereeing designator and Inter officials,” continued the statement.
The most important missing element here was direct contact between Rocchi and the club, although it was revealed today for the first time that Inter had been under formal investigation too. The simultaneous case against Inter has been dropped as well. The evidence has been passed on to the sporting justice system, who could still choose to look further into the matter and present other charges.
Rocchi stepped down during the investigation, with Dino Tommasi and then Daniele Orsato taking over. Documents concerning this incident have been passed to the Monza Public Prosecutor’s Office, as the VAR operations room falls under their jurisdiction.