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ROME, Dec 14 - Juventus team doctor Riccardo
Agricola was cleared of sporting fraud by Turin's court of
appeal on Wednesday.
The decision overturned the guilty verdict handed down by
another Turin court last November when Agricola was given a
22-month suspended prison sentence for administering the banned
blood-booster EPO to the club's players between 1994 and 1998.
Juventus's managing director Antonio Giraudo was also
cleared of sporting fraud on Wednesday.
Giraudo was cleared at the original trial. But Turin public
prosecutor Raffaele Guarinello, who conducted a four-year
investigation into medical practices at the 28-times Italian
champions, had asked for his evidence to be reconsidered by the
court of appeal.
Last month, during his final presentation for the
prosecution, Guarinello called for a three-year, two-month
sentence for Agricola and a two-year sentence for Giraudo.
"Finally justice has been done after years of insinuation
and cruel things being said about us," Giraudo was quoted as
saying on La Gazzetta dello Sport's website.
"Today is a great day. I'm delighted. I never lost hope and
we were sure that it would work out in our favour."
Guarinello's investigation was prompted by comments made in
a 1998 magazine interview by then AS Roma coach Zdenek Zeman
that Italian football needed to "get out of the pharmacy". In
the interview Zeman pointed the finger at Juventus.
He focused on the 1994-1998 period, one of the most
successful in Juventus's history when they won three Serie A
titles and the 1996 European Cup.
Many of the club's former players were called to give
evidence during the original trial, including three times World
Player of the Year Zinedine Zidane, ex-Chelsea manager Gianluca
Vialli, now a television presenter, and 1993 European Footballer
of the Year Roberto Baggio.