Supercoppa to stay in China

The Lega Calcio has announced that the Italian Super Cup final will be held in China for the next three years.

The news follows a successful experiment in August, which saw the Supercoppa Italiana - the traditional curtain raiser to the season between the Serie A champions and the Coppa Italia winners - held in the Chinese capital Beijing.

Lazio emerged the winners against Inter at the iconic Bird's Nest Stadium in front of nearly 80,000 spectators and millions more through television.

"We have a draft agreement with the Chinese to play in the coming three years the Supercoppa Italiana final in their country," announced Lega Calcio President Maurizio Beretta.

"It is not necessarily true that they will all have to be played in Beijing, though."

Before this year, the Supercoppa had three previous dates on foreign soil with AC Milan prevailing in Washington (USA) in 1993 and Juventus lifting the trophy in Tripoli (Libya) in 2002 and in New York (USA) 12 months later.

"Italian football is in excellent health, as proved by the sale of our television rights both in Italy and abroad," added Beretta. "In fact, we have recorded a significant increase in the value of the rights packages."

Source: Lega Calcio