Italy: Federation president Carlo Tavecchio wants a Serie A with only 18 teams in 2016-17

"We hope in 2015 to complete the mother of the battles, which is the reform of the championships. We need to consider the 'Azzurri' (the Italian national team) as the most important (priority) of the nation. The reform of the championships, with the reduction of the number of the teams, will result in less problems for the national team," said Carlo Tavecchio, president of the FIGC (Italian Football Federation), to Italian media on 27/12/2014.

The reform of the format and size of the professional championships format "is the great goal of 2015, together with qualification for Euro 2016 (France from 10/06 to 10/07/2016)," added Carlo Tavecchio. "We want, as required by the current regulations, to have passed the resolution on the format of the championships for the 2016-17 season by 30/06/2015: a Serie A with 18 clubs, a Serie B with 20, and Lega Pro clubs (third division) to be monitored and also keep in mind that the Serie D (fourth division) has significant room for development," said the president of the FIGC.

"The debate on the number of teams in Serie A is open and we need to…