The Scot at the centre of the Gazzetta Football Italia phenomenon

The Herald Scotland

11-05-2025

The idea came from Paul Gascoigne's move to Lazio from Tottenham Hotspur, as media company Chrysalis correctly surmised that there would be huge interest in how the cheeky chappie star of English football's move to the continent would play out.
What nobody foresaw was that a weekend window to watch world class talents like Roberto Baggio, Gabriel Batistuta, Paolo Maldini and Guiseppe Signori strut their stuff would be so eagerly lapped up and become essential viewing for so many. At its peak, Football Italia regularly attracted 800,000 weekly viewers, while the Sunday matches once captivated three million.
These were the days before social media and ubiquitous access to football the world over, but the novelty was only part of the story. The show had its own unique tone, part light humour (see the famous opening sequence of Richardson and Attilio Lombardo performing the Lambada) and part serious news and analysis of what were, at the time, the very best sides in Europe.
Scotland hero Joe Jordan, who himself had enjoyed a spell playing and living in Italy a decade or so earlier, was a valued and popular contributor as a pundit and co-commentator. The secret to its success, he muses, was likely down to the combination of knowledgeable insight, and the quality of the fare on the field.
'James and the crew, they were very good,' Jordan said.
'And I think why a lot of people enjoyed it was because it was a real insight into Serie A, which at that particular time was the best league in the world.
'Back then, there were restrictions on the number of foreign players you could have in the team, of course, but there were a lot of world-class players that came from all over the world to play there.
(Image: Channel 4) 'I enjoyed doing it, but it was a serious programme. You were working on something that maybe hadn't happened before, where people here in this country were seeing what football was really like elsewhere.
'And James Richardson, he went into that in the build-up to the games, and gave great insights into things like the professionalism of the players. If a football player was to go there, I think they would have learned a lot.
'It was an eye-opener for people to get that insight into the league, to the players that were there, and the way that football was played. And the support as well, because the crowds…all the stadiums through Serie A were more or less full.
'So, for the fans back home, I think the build-up to it by James and his crew, and then the quality of football that they were seeing there, I think the fans would have enjoyed that.'
Jordan is now 73 and enjoying retirement, but he was still in management when he was throwing in his tuppenceworth on the Italian game on television, and he was struck by how embedded in the culture of the dressing rooms he was still involved in that Football Italia – and the latest goings on in Serie A as a whole - had become.
'What you have now in England is arguably the best league in the world, so there's a lot of talk about that,' he said.
'But in the days going back to when I was in Serie A, Italy were world champions, so that had a lot to do with it. There were a lot of terrific Italian players then, and then after that, it just grew and people wanted to see it.
'When the programme came along, and I was involved in the game as a manager or a coach, the players at the clubs I was at were always watching it on a Saturday morning before the games. They were up to date on it, they loved watching it, and then they would watch whatever game was being shown on a Sunday.
'It was a big thing for the football players as well as the supporters, absolutely.'
As Jordan mentions, the seed of Italian football's appeal to the British supporter at that time may well have been germinated long before 'Gazzamania' hit the Stadio Olimpico, when he and his contemporaries like Graeme Souness were similarly being taken to the hearts of Italian fans in the early to mid-80s.
It was a life-changing experience for Jordan then, and one that continued to prove valuable as it opened doors in later years to his involvement with Football Italia.
'Well, for me, it was a new chapter in my career that I was looking forward to going and experiencing, and I was lucky enough to get that opportunity,' he said.
(Image: Getty Images) 'I was 29 at the time, and I'd had opportunities which never came off prior to that to go and play in Germany and in Holland. So, at that stage where I was, I was very fortunate to go to a club like AC Milan and then Verona.
'If you'd have asked any of the players at that time, they would have liked that challenge and that opportunity to go and play there and live there. And I have still a lot of connections in different parts of Italy that I keep in contact with.
'So, if it hadn't happened for me, it would have been a bit of a regret, an 'if only'. But I was there for three years. It wasn't easy, in respect of the football, but it was good, and the preparations and things like that were different, and you got on and you did it. But I would not have sacrificed that opportunity that I had, and I learnt from it.
'It was one of the best moves of my career.'
As it is proving to be for the current generation of Scots who are now plying their trade in Italy. The fiercely patriotic Jordan has been buoyed to see the likes of Scott McTominay, Billy Gilmour, Lewis Ferguson and Che Adams flourish in Serie A, believing that exposure to the culture and to the country will be to their own and to the national side's betterment.
There may never be another Football Italia, but scores of Scottish football fans are now following their progress on the plethora of channels available to them, as Jordan is too.
'It's great for them,' he said.
'First of all, they're playing football at a high level. They will be learning week in and week out what it's all about to play for a club like Napoli or Bologna. These are big clubs, with a lot of pressure on them to be able to handle that.
'They have shown by doing that that they are international players and that is something that will give them confidence themselves, because they're doing it at a really high level and there a lot of things that they will be facing both on and off the pitch.
'I know football is football but there is a lot of preparations and things like that that will make them better players. There's no question about that.
'You're going to play at the Maradona Stadium with 70,000-odd fans there. You can't ask for anything more than that, and they are doing really well.
'That's a compliment to them but also for the national team it's great, because you want your players to be playing at a higher level.
'They are doing that, and they have proven that they can handle that. Therefore, they are clearly good players, and I've got to say that Scotland need them.'