Serie A giants Juventus have released a statement confirming that the club's entire board of directors have resigned following a meeting held on Monday evening.
Club president Andrea Agnelli, vice-chairman Pavel Nedved and CEO Maurizio Arrivabene are among those who have handed in their resignation, although the latter will remain in his position while a new board is assembled.
Agnelli, 46, leaves his post as president after 12 years with the Old Lady, who won nine consecutive Serie A titles during his tenure between 2011-12 and 2019-20.
Nedved, who made over 300 appearances for Juve in the final eight years of his playing career, joined the board of directors in 2010 – the same year as Agnelli – before becoming vice-chairman in 2015.
As for Arrivabene, the 65-year-old had served as an independent board member since 2012, and he spent five years as Team principal of Formula 1 team Scuderia Ferrari before becoming Juve CEO in 2021.
Progetto di bilancio d'esercizio e bilancio consolidato al 30 giugno 2022 | Rinnovo del Consiglio di Amministrazionehttps://t.co/pQmoqkROJC pic.twitter.com/0e7NZc3mND
— JuventusFC (@juventusfc) November 28, 2022
Along with Agnelli, Nedved and Arrivabene, fellow board members Laurence Debroux, Massimo Della Ragione, Kathryn Fink, Daniela Marilungo, Francesco Roncaglio, Giorgio Tacchia and Suzanne Heywood are also understood to have resigned from their posts.
The announcement comes amid an investigation by police into charges including false accounting against the club and concerns relating to "revenues from player registration rights" between 2019 and 2021.
Juventus, who denied any wrongdoing last month following these allegations, have confirmed that a shareholders' meeting scheduled for November 23 was postponed last week and moved to December 27.
A club statement released on Monday read: "Today, Juventus Football Club S.p.A. published pro-forma financial information to comply with Consob's Resolution dated 19 October 2022 adopted pursuant to art. 154-ter, comma 7, of Legislative Decree No. 58/1998 ("TUF").
"In order to ensure maximum transparency and adequate time for the shareholders to examine the aforementioned information, the Board of Directors of the Company, which met today, resolved to postpone the Shareholders' Meeting, previously scheduled for 23 November 2022, to 27 December 2022."
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The statement continued: "Given the centrality and relevance of legal issues and technical-accounting pending, [board members] have deemed, in accordance with the best social interest, to recommend that Juventus provide a new Board of Directors to address these issues.
"Juventus will continue to cooperate with supervisory and industry authorities, without prejudice to the protection of its rights in relation to disputes against the financial statements and communications of the Company by CONSOB and by the Prosecutor's Office."
Juventus, who are currently managed by Massimiliano Allegri, remain under investigation while they plan to construct a new board in the coming months.
The Italian giants have finished fourth in each of the last two Serie A seasons, and earlier this year announced losses of £220m (€254.3m) from the financial year ending on June 30, 2022 – a record loss for any club in Italian top-flight history.
Oliver Thomas
