体坛英语新闻：Conte lucky not to get longer ban, says judge

ROME, Aug. 22 (Xinhua) -- Juventus head coach Antonio Conte should have felt lucky to get only a ten-month ban rather than a three-year one, one of the judges in the betting trial insisted.

Conte was cleared of one of the two counts of failing to report a potential fix while he was at Siena, but the 10-month ban was confirmed on appeal on Wednesday morning, prompting a furious response from Juve.

"The Novara-Siena accusation was removed, but the other seemed very serious to us and perhaps should've been dealt with differently," Federal Court member Piero Sandulli was quoted as say by Radio Capital.

"This is why the ban was confirmed. On Novara-Siena it seemed illogical that such a senior and experienced coach would say in the locker room 'we're drawing this one.'"

"However, with regards to the Albinoleffe match it's probable the request for sporting fraud would've been more suitable for the issue.

"We can say that he was lucky, especially as he was cleared for one of the two accusations. With sporting fraud he'd have been banned for three years."

The only evidence against Conte is the testimony of former Siena player Filippo Carobbio, who claimed the coach had assured his squad the results in those two games were already under lock and key.

The other Siena players who were in the team meetings disputed Carobbio's version of events, but his testimony was still considered credible enough to inflict the ban.