The protest comes in the wake of the Turin giants being docked 15 points following an investigation into club finances Broadcasters Sky and DAZN face huge losses as thousands of Juventus fans cancel their memberships. This action comes after their beloved club was docked 15 points in the Italian Serie A and dropped to 10th in the table. Just one point from the two games which followed, a 3-3 draw with Atalanta at home and a 2-0 loss to now fellow mid-table side Monza also at home, has seen them drop to 13th in the Italian top flight, 15 points adrift of Champions League qualification, for which they were competing until the conclusion of the Italian court's investigation. Anger among fans continues to grow over what many deem unjust punishment, and this sentiment is developing into a protest movement which has seen more and more Juventus supporters cancel their subscriptions to official Serie A broadcast partners Sky and DAZN. It is estimated that the number of cancellations could reach 500,000, which in financial terms would mean a combined £136m loss in turnover for the linear TV giant Sky and online disruptor DAZN. Former Juventus Chief Football Officer, and current Managing Director of Football at Spurs, Fabio Paritici has been handed a two-year ban from football. However, with this punishment handed down from an Italian court, it is currently unclear to what extent that will impact the Italian's role at the Premier League club. Meanwhile, former Chairman Andrea Agnelli has been banned for two years, and ex-vice chairman Pavel Nedved has been suspended for eight months, for their role in alleged misdeeds related to transfers. The decision to dock Juventus 15 points, the one which has sparked much outrage among fans, was made by the Federal Prosecutor's Office in Italy. Other clubs deemed to have broken the rules were given fines. The decision by many Juventus fans to turn their backs on the Serie A and on Sky and DAZN could reportedly cause huge issues for the broadcasters, and the overall landscape of football broadcasting in the country. Juventus is by far the most-followed club in Italian football, both in terms of season tickets sold at the stadium and crucially TV viewership, and so a loss of hundreds of thousands of subscribers is said to be a very worrying possibility to executives at Sky and DAZN. Within hours of the official decision, thousands of tweets began circulating under the hashtags #DisdettaDAZN and #DisdettaSky (#CancelDAZN and #CancelSky) with further online protests expected to gain momentum as the season goes on. Thousands of fans have already taken the step of cancelling and some have even staged in-person protest outside the stadium before games. Juventus are likely to struggle to achieve even UEFA Europa Conference League qualification from Serie A now, should the points deduction be upheld after appeal, which could subsequently damage their ability to recruit quality players in the coming seasons, and have a widespread detrimental effect on the club's finances and performance for years to come. These possibilities have left online Juventus fans enraged and looking to protest. However, there is the possibility that the punishment could be overruled following the club's ongoing appeal to the Italian Olympic Committee. Were that to be the case, the Turin club would be rewarded the 15 points back and could see their standing in the table improved dramatically. There is still so much left to find out about the case, but right now broadcasters are bearing the brunt of these Juventus fan mass cancellations and will be very concerned about how the situation is going to develop. Don't forget that you can watch every single Serie A match via our legal and reliable, low cost football live streams. We provide coverage of some of the biggest competitions in the world including Serie A, La Liga, Ligue 1 and many more.
