Del Piero libel action dropped by court

February 25, 2002
Daily Soccer

ROME - The libel action by Juventus striker Alessandro Del Piero against former AS Roma coach Zdenek Zeman has been dropped by the orders of Rome prosecutor Bruno Azzolini, ANSA news agency reported Monday.

Zeman, now coach of second division Salernitana, caused a furore in a 1998 edition of Espresso when he claimed doping was rife in football and in particular mentioned Juventus club and players Del Piero and Gianluca Vialli.

The interview, entitled 'Football has the same illness as the Tour de France', led to a judicial probe into doping by Turin magistrates with officials from Juventus currently under trial in a related affair.

Azzolini accepted the request of lawyer Giancarlo Amato who said that Del Piero had not been libelled by Zeman, who hails from the Czech Republic.

"The defendant (Zeman) exercised a free right to say what he thought without any painful claims about the plaintiff which would injure his reputation," Amato had argued.

Zeman had referred to an 'explosion of muscles' in the physiques of Del Piero and Vialli in the article.
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