The 2018–19 Serie C was the 60th season of the Serie C, the third tier of the Italian football league system, organized by the Lega Pro.
Teams The league originally featured 60 teams. However, it saw the bankruptcy and subsequent withdrawal of Andria, Mestre, Reggiana and Vicenza.
To fill the vacancies in Serie B, Novara, Catania and Siena became the repechage candidates from Serie C, to the objection of Pro Vercelli and Ternana. However, on 10 August Lega B announced that a 19-team calendar would be commissioned for the 2018–19 and no repechage would take place.
The first team of Bassano Virtus was relocated to Vicenza as L.R. Vicenza Virtus. While its owner, had also acquired some assets from the liquidators of Vicenza.
On 3 August 2018, it was officially announced by the Italian Football Federation (FIGC) that Juventus Under 23 would take part in Serie C, making it the first "B Team" in Italy to do so since 1934. Also, Cavese and Imolese were admitted from Serie D to fill the vacancies created.
Due to several issues regarding vacancies and trials at both Serie B and Serie C level, the Serie C league committee delayed the season kickoff day to September, also hinting at the possibility of an indefinite delay because of the unclear situation. The season eventually kicked off on Saturday 15 September, but saw all games of Novara, Pro Vercelli, Ternana, Siena and Catania delayed indefinitely due to their judicial requests to be admitted to Serie B, as well as Viterbese, after the club threatened not to participate in Serie C due to their opposition to being admitted to the Southern group. Virtus Entella's second game was also delayed after the club was accepted on appeal for being readmitted to Serie B by the Regional Administrative Court of Lazio (, TAR Lazio).
On 14 February 2019, Matera were excluded from Serie C for missing four consecutive matches which was followed by the exclusion of Pro Piacenza on 18 February 2019 after missing several games and presenting a makeshift team composed of teenagers and a physiotherapist in their final game, where they were beaten 20-0 by Cuneo.
Promotion and relegation rule changes On 30 January 2019, it was announced that five teams rather than the usual four would be promoted to Serie B for the 2019-20 season, after FIGC decided to incorporate an extra club in Serie B to bring the league up to 20 teams. The decision also meant that only seven clubs would be relegated to Serie D rather than the original eight.
Due to the exclusions of Pro Piacenza and Matera from the league, the football league committee, in accordance with the Italian Football Federation, agreed on 2 April 2019 to a change in the relegation rules, by decreasing the number of relegations to five as follows:
Group A, which originally featured 20 teams, later reduced to 19 following the exclusion of Pro Piacenza, will have no direct relegation unless there are eight or more points between the last and second-last placed team at the conclusion of the regular season. In the case of less than eight points between the two bottom teams, a two-legged relegation playoff will be played. Group B (20 teams), as the only one that was not affected by league exclusion, will have a direct relegation for the bottom placed team in the regular season, plus a two-legged relegation playoff between the 18th and 19th placed team. Group C (19 teams, later reduced to 18 teams due to Matera's exclusion) will feature the same relegation system as in Group A. The two relegation playoff winners from Group A and Group C (or the respective second-last placed teams in the regular season, in case of no relegation playoff being held) will subsequently take part in another relegation playoff to determine the fifth team relegated to Serie D in 2019–20.
Relegated from Serie B
Novara Pro Vercelli Ternana Virtus Entella
Promoted from Serie D Gozzano (Girone A winners) Pro Patria (Girone B winners and 2017–18 Serie D title holders) Virtus Verona (Girone C winners) Rimini (Girone D winners) Albissola (Girone E winners) Vis Pesaro (Girone F winners) Rieti (Girone G winners) Potenza (Girone H winners) Vibonese (Girone I winners) Imolese (Girone D runner-up and playoff winner) Cavese (Girone H runner-up and playoff winner)
Repechage Juventus U23 (newly founded B team)
Stadia and locations
Group A (North & Central West) 7 teams from Tuscany, 6 teams from Piedmont, 2 teams from Emilia-Romagna, 2 teams from Sardinia, 2 teams from Liguria and 1 team from Lombardy.
Club City Stadium Capacity Albissola Albissola Marina Albisola Superiore Comunale (Chiavari) 5,535 Alessandria Alessandria Giuseppe Moccagatta 5,827 Arezzo Arezzo Città di Arezzo 13,128 Arzachena Arzachena Biagio Pirina 3,100 Carrarese Carrara Dei Marmi 9,500 Cuneo Cuneo Fratelli Paschiero 4,000 Gozzano Gozzano Alfredo d'Albertas / Silvio Piola (Vercelli) 400 / 5,500 Juventus U23 Turin Giuseppe Moccagatta (Alessandria) 5,827 Lucchese Lucca Porta Elisa 7,386 Novara Novara Silvio Piola (Novara) 17,875 Olbia Olbia Bruno Nespoli 3,200 Piacenza Piacenza Leonardo Garilli 21,668 Pisa Pisa Arena Garibaldi – Romeo Anconetani 25,000 Pistoiese Pistoia Marcello Melani 13,195 Pontedera Pontedera Ettore Mannucci 5,000 Pro Patria Busto Arsizio Carlo Speroni 4,627 Pro Piacenza Piacenza Leonardo Garilli 21,668 Pro Vercelli Vercelli Silvio Piola (Vercelli) 5,500 Siena Siena Montepaschi Arena 15,373 Virtus Entella Chiavari Comunale 5,535
Group B (North & Central East) 5 teams from Lombardy, 4 teams from Marche, 3 teams from Emilia-Romagna, 2 teams from Friuli-Venezia Giulia, 2 teams from Umbria, 2 teams from Veneto, 1 team from Abruzzo and 1 team from Trentino-Alto Adige.
Club City Stadium Capacity AlbinoLeffe Albino and Leffe Atleti Azzurri d'Italia (Bergamo) 21,300 Fano Fano Raffaele Mancini 8,800 FeralpiSalò Salò Lino Turina 2,500 Fermana Fermo Bruno Recchioni 9,500 Giana Erminio Gorgonzola Città di Gorgonzola 3,766 Gubbio Gubbio Pietro Barbetti 5,300 Imolese Imola Romeo Galli 4,000 L.R. Vicenza Vicenza Romeo Menti 12,000 Monza Monza Brianteo 18,568 Pordenone Pordenone Ottavio Bottecchia 3,000 Ravenna Ravenna Bruno Benelli 12,020 Renate Renate Città di Meda (Meda) 3,000 Rimini Rimini Romeo Neri 7,442 Sambenedettese San Benedetto del Tronto Riviera delle Palme 14,995 Südtirol Bolzano/Bozen Druso 3,500 Teramo Teramo Gaetano Bonolis 7,498 Ternana Terni Libero Liberati 17,460 Triestina Trieste Nereo Rocco 32,454 Virtus Verona Verona Gavagnin Nocini 1,200 Vis Pesaro Pesaro Tonino Benelli 4,898
Group C (South) 4 teams from Calabria, 4 teams from Campania, 4 teams from Sicily, 3 teams from Apulia, 2 teams from Basilicata, 2 teams from Lazio.
Club City Stadium Capacity Bisceglie Bisceglie Gustavo Ventura 5,000 Casertana Caserta Alberto Pinto 12,000 Catania Catania Angelo Massimino 20,266 Catanzaro Catanzaro Nicola Ceravolo 14,650 Cavese Cava de' Tirreni Simonetta Lamberti 5,200 Juve Stabia Castellammare di Stabia Romeo Menti 7,642 Matera Matera Stadio XXI Settembre-Franco Salerno 8,500 Monopoli Monopoli Vito Simone Veneziani 6,880 Paganese Pagani Marcello Torre 5,900 Potenza Potenza Alfredo Viviani 6,000 Reggina Reggio Calabria Oreste Granillo 27,454 Rende Rende Marco Lorenzon 5,000 Rieti Rieti Manlio Scopigno 10,163 Sicula Leonzio Lentini Angelino Nobile 2,500 Siracusa Siracusa Nicola De Simone 6,870 Trapani Trapani Polisportivo Provinciale (Erice) 7,000 Vibonese Vibo Valentia Luigi Razza 6,500 Virtus Francavilla Francavilla Fontana Giovanni Paolo II 5,000 Viterbese Castrense Viterbo Enrico Rocchi 5,460
League tables
Group A (North & Central West)
Group B (North & Central East)
Group C (South)
Promotion play-offs
First Round If tied, higher-placed team advances.
Second Round If tied, higher-placed team advances.
Quarter-finals If tied on aggregate, higher-placed team advances.
Semi-finals If tied on aggregate, higher-placed team advances.
Finals If tied on aggregate, the winner is decided by extra-time and penalty shootout.
Relegation play-outs
First Round Higher-placed team plays at home for second leg. If tied on aggregate, lower-placed team is relegated.
Final If tied on aggregate, extra time and eventually penalty shoot-out are played. Losers are relegated.
Top goalscorers RankPlayerClubGoals1 Pablo Granoche3Triestina202 Francesco Tavano1Carrarese183 Matteo Brunori Sandri4Arezzo17 Luigi CastaldoCasertana5 Leonardo CandellonePordenone15 Ettore GliozziRobur Siena Eric Lanini1Imolese Fabio PernaGiana Erminio9 Giuseppe Caccavallo1Carrarese14 Eugenio D'UrsiCatanzaro Manuel Fischnaller1 Riccardo MartignagoAlbissola
Note 1Player scored 1 goal in the play-offs. 3Player scored 3 goals in the play-offs. 4Player scored 4 goals in the play-offs.
References
External links Official website