The 2002–03 Serie A (known as the Serie A TIM for sponsorship reasons) was the 101st season of top-tier Italian football, the 71st in a round-robin tournament. It was composed by 18 teams, for the 15th consecutive time from season 1988–89.
The first two teams qualified directly to UEFA Champions League. Teams finishing in third and fourth position had to play Champions League qualifications. Teams finishing in fifth and sixth positions qualified to UEFA Cup (another spot was given to the winner of Coppa Italia). The bottom four teams were to be relegated in Serie B.
Juventus won its 27th national title, with Internazionale placing second and Milan third. Lazio was admitted to the UEFA Champions League preliminary phase, whereas Parma, Udinese and Roma (through the Coppa Italia finals) obtained a spot to the next UEFA Cup. Brescia and Perugia were admitted to participate in the UEFA Intertoto Cup, after Chievo declined to participate.
Piacenza, Torino, Como and Atalanta were relegated to Serie B, with the latter after having lost a relegation play-off against Reggina.
Rule changes Unlike La Liga, which imposed a quota on the number of non-EU players on each club, Serie A clubs could sign as many non-EU players as available on domestic transfer. But for the 2003–04 season a quota was imposed on each of the clubs limiting the number of non-EU, non-EFTA and non-Swiss players who may be signed from abroad each season, following provisional measures introduced in the 2002–03 season, which allowed Serie A & B clubs to sign only one non-EU player in the 2002 summer transfer window.
Managerial changes Team Outgoing manager Manner of departure Date of vacancy Position in table Incoming manager Date of appointmentUdinese Giampiero Ventura End of contract 30 June 2002 Pre-season Luciano Spalletti 1 July 2002Reggina Franco Colomba Bortolo MuttiPiacenza Walter Novellino Andrea AgostinelliParma Pietro Carmignani Cesare PrandelliLazio Alberto Zaccheroni Roberto ManciniTorino Giancarlo Camolese Sacked 25 October 2002 16th Renato Zaccarelli (caretaker) 26 October 2002 Renato Zaccarelli End of caretaker spell 29 October 2002 17th Renzo Ulivieri 30 October 2002Reggina Bortolo Mutti Sacked 7 November 2002 16th Luigi De Canio 8 November 2002Como Loris Dominissini 25 November 2002 18th Eugenio Fascetti 25 November 2002Piacenza Andrea Agostinelli 3 February 2003 16th Luigi Cagni 3 February 2003Torino Renzo Ulivieri 24 February 2003 17th Renato Zaccarelli 24 February 2003 Renato Zaccarelli 15 April 2003 18th Giacomo Ferri 15 April 2003Atalanta Giovanni Vavassori 21 April 2003 15th Giancarlo Finardi 21 April 2003
Personnel and sponsoring
Team Chairman Head coach Kit manufacturer Shirt sponsor Atalanta Ivan Ruggeri Giancarlo Finardi Asics Promatech Bologna Renato Cipollini Francesco Guidolin Macron Area Banca Brescia Luigi Corioni Carlo Mazzone Umbro Banca Lombarda Chievo Luca Campedelli Luigi Del Neri Joma Paluani Como* Enrico Preziosi Eugenio Fascetti Erreà Temporary Empoli* Fabrizio Corsi Silvio Baldini Erreà Sammontana Internazionale Massimo Moratti Héctor Cúper Nike Pirelli Juventus Vittorio Chiusano Marcello Lippi Lotto Fastweb/Tamoil (in UEFA matches) Lazio Sergio Cragnotti Ugo Longo Roberto Mancini Puma Siemens MobileMilan Silvio Berlusconi Carlo Ancelotti Adidas Opel Modena* Romano Amadei Gianni De Biasi Erreà Immergas Parma Stefano Tanzi Cesare Prandelli Champion Parmalat Perugia Luciano Gaucci Serse Cosmi Galex Toyota Piacenza Fabrizio Garilli Luigi Cagni Lotto LPR Brakes Reggina* Pasquale Foti Luigi De Canio Asics Caffè Mauro Roma Francesco Sensi Fabio Capello Kappa Mazda Torino Attilio Romero Giacomo Ferri Asics Ixfin Udinese Franco Soldati Luciano Spalletti Le Coq Sportif Bernardi (*) Promoted from Serie B.
League table
Results
Overall Most wins - Juventus (21) Fewest wins - Como and Torino (4) Most draws - Lazio and Brescia (15) Fewest draws - Piacenza (6) Most losses - Torino (21) Fewest losses - Juventus and Lazio (4) Most goals scored - Juventus and Internazionale (64) Fewest goals scored - Torino (23) Most goals conceded - Piacenza (62) Fewest goals conceded - Juventus (29)
Relegation tie-breaker
Reggina won 2 – 1 on aggregate.
Atalanta relegated to Serie B.
Top goalscorers RankPlayerClubGoals1 Christian VieriInternazionale242 Adrian MutuParma183 Filippo InzaghiMilan174 Alessandro Del PieroJuventus166 AdrianoParma15 Claudio LópezLazio8 Dario HübnerPiacenza14 Francesco TottiRoma10 Antonio Di NataleEmpoli13
Transfer Summer Transfer Winter Transfer co-ownership co-ownership
Attendances Source:
# Club Avg. attendance Highest 1 Internazionale 61,943 76,660 2 AC Milan 61,534 78,843 3 AS Roma 57,160 74,313 4 SS Lazio 44,129 69,877 5 Juventus FC 39,771 57,762 6 Bologna FC 24,489 36,178 7 Reggina Calcio 24,102 26,640 8 ChievoVerona 16,902 34,544 9 Udinese Calcio 16,859 26,694 10 Parma AC 16,306 25,603 11 Brescia Calcio 15,739 22,039 12 Atalanta BC 15,483 23,647 13 Torino FC 14,870 32,947 14 Modena FC 14,291 16,227 15 AC Perugia 10,311 22,020 16 Empoli FC 9,127 18,700 17 Piacenza Calcio 8,198 15,029 18 Como 1907 7,320 12,452
References and sources
Almanacco Illustrato del Calcio - La Storia 1898-2004, Panini Edizioni, Modena, September 2005
External links :it:Classifica calcio Serie A italiana 2003 - Italian version with pictures and info. Italy 2002/03 - All results on RSSSF Website. 2002/2003 Serie A Squads - (www.footballsquads.com)