Briatore blasts Italian football

clipped from uk.reuters.com ROME (Reuters) – Renault Formula One Team boss and Queens Park Rangers co-owner Flavio Briatore has blasted the Italian football world and lauded the sport in Britain for its fair play and meritocracy. “Here you are on market and you play in a clean competition, where the rules have no shadowy areas,” he told the Italian edition of GQ magazine when asked why he bought into an English Championship (second division club) instead of one in his homeland. Italian football is attempting to recover from a series of troubles, including the death of a fan and a police officer in separate incidents last year and the 2006 match-fixing scandal that led to Juventus being relegated to the second tier. But Briatore, who completed his takeover of QPR with Formula One supremo Bernie Ecclestone in November, is not optimistic about the future.