PARMA, Italy — The fields are covered in burnt-out patches. The crossbar of one goal hangs limply, split straight down the middle. Most of the offices inside the spacious headquarters are dark and empty.
At first glance, it might seem that the local soccer team — the one that went through a humiliating, and very public, bankruptcy in the spring — is dead. But on a sweltering afternoon a few weeks ago, one of the club’s new executives was giddy.
“Look, look,” Luca Carra, the team’s general manager, said as he held out his keychain. “See? I just got the clicker to open up the gate outside.