Greek sports exec Lina Souloukou resigns as CEO of Roma FC

Roma's announcement: “Roma announces that CEO Lina Souloukou has resigned from her role. We thank Lina for her dedication at a critical time for the club and wish her all the best in her future endeavours. Ownership remains fully committed to Roma's growth and success, with a continued focus on the values ​​that make our club so special."

The background behind Souloukou's resignation
The past week was more than intense for Roma who sees another year... lost early and the organization like a volcano about to explode and Lina Soloukou at the center of the reactions.

The poor season (three draws and one defeat) saw the sacking of Daniele De Rossi, but the former Giallorossi ace was hugely loved by the fans and his departure sparked outrage.

Anger that translated into verbal attacks on the footballers outside the training ground, but also a storm of negative comments on social media for Ms Sulukou as reports suggested that her poor relations with De Rossi led to his sacking.

In fact, the Italian media from the first moment targeted the Greek executive, stressing that with her arrival she had made major changes by removing people with many years of service to the club, while adding that she had bad relationships and with Jose Mourinho (whom De Rossi had replaced last year).

"Lina the evil of Rome," read the banner that appeared outside the team's training center, at the same time that the whole city was filled with stickers aimed at her.

With the thermometer rising dangerously high and the threats red hot, the police authorities in Rome decided to place Mrs. Souloucou and her family (her two children aged 8 and 3 when they go to school) under discretionary protection.

This measure has been in place since last Thursday and it remains to be seen how long it will continue with Roma hosting Udinese on Sunday night (19:00) for Ivan Juric's bench debut...

And a possible negative result, one understands, can be the reason ffor igniting fan outrage with all that entails.

Who is Lina Souloukou

As the daughter of former goalkeeper and football coach, Sotiris, Lina Souloukou was exposed to the world's most popular sport from a very young age, and as it turned out, this was her destined path.

Knowing sports from the inside, having been a volleyball player for several years, she left for Spain where she practiced as a lawyer (on Sports Law), before working as an independent general counsel.

In contrast to a well-known sports exec with an "average mentality" who, as she recalls, said to her: "What are you doing here anyway? You should be in your kitchen making moussaka for your children", the president of Olympiakos, Vangelis Marinakis, singled out her value and gave her the opportunity to develop and grow in the field.

She did so immediately and within a short period of time she became Head of Legal Affairs (2016) and two years later (2018) she was promoted to the role of CEO. She remained in this post until last summer.

Alongside her role at Olympiakos, she was also an Executive Member of the Board of Directors of the European Club Association (ECA), remaining a member of its Board of Directors until today.

"Football is a conservative industry and that's something you can see even at ECA. You look around and everywhere there are white men, CEOs, presidents", said Souloukou specifically in the same interview on Off the Pitch which she gave shortly after her departure from "G. Karaiskakis" and her highly successful transition from there.

Regarding her passage from Piraeus as such, she commented in the same Medium:

“In four years we have won three league titles in a row, played in two Champions Leagues and at the same time managed to sell and develop players in the UK. Overall it was an incredible experience.

At first it was a big test. It is difficult to convince the football world to trust a female executive. But we have a diverse environment. Portuguese coach, black French manager, three female managers. I think that was part of our success.

I was very lucky to have the support of management. They trusted me in this role and supported the changes in structure that I wanted us to move forward in these four years. I didn't feel like I had an enemy against me.

How it was handled outside I don't know, but in those four years I think everyone made a huge contribution and believed that a female executive could be just as successful.

That a woman can bring something different to the sport is something I also believe in fervently."