Italian club penalized in betting scandal

ROME (AP) -- Italian second-division club Catanzaro received a five-point penalty to start the season and had four players suspended Monday in the latest decisions handed out in a soccer betting scandal.

Pasquale Lo Giudice was banned for three years and three other players for the club -- Fabrizio Ferrigno, Ivano Pastore and Luca Gentili -- received five-month suspensions.

Officials decided not to annul last season's Serie C1 championship won by Catanzaro or revoke the team's promotion to Serie B, as prosecutors had requested.

Still, the club was not satisfied with the ruling.

"We will appeal, because Catanzaro must be acquitted," the team's lawyer Giancarlo Pittelli said.

Four players on different teams implicated in the scandal also received bans: Grosseto's Salvatore Ambrosino (three years and eight months), Chieti's Gianni Califano (three years and six months), Spezia's Giuseppe Alessi (five months) and Benevento's Alberto Nocerino (five months).

Other teams implicated in the scandal were acquitted.

For several months, judicial investigators have been looking into an alleged organized-crime betting ring suspected of fixing matches in Italy's top three divisions.

Last month, Serie A squads Chievo and Siena were cleared from the harshest penalties while several players in the top two leagues were suspended. Also, like Catanzaro, Serie B's Modena was penalized five points.