Independent Reading Prompt 15 Chapter 8

The picture to the left is an Italian car ad for the company Opel. The bald headed man to the left of the cars is Pierluigi Collina, he is a soccer referee. This picture symbolizes the chapter of my book titled How Soccer Explains The New Oligarchs. The chapter begins with the topic of how in Italy referee's are revered and scrutinized unlike any other place in the world. Elevated to almost celebrity status, televisions programs are dedicated entirely to evaluating their latest games. He goes on to describe the process of how the owners of Italian Clubs Juventus of Turin and AC Milan have their hands in manipulating the government and economies to their benefit. For example AC Milan was purchased by Silvio Berlusconi in the 1980s, since he has built a worldwide empire purchasing up real estate, television stations, newspapers, advertising, and insurance. In the USA theirs a channel devoted entirely to the NFL. AC Milan has it's own channel. People love and hate AC Milan