Parma

For years, Parma stood for everything good and successful about modern Italy: affluent, efficient and cultured, it was an isola felice [happy island] where locals would sit at bars near their exquisite Romanesque cathedral eating their world-famous ham and cheese, talking about opera and, above all, football. In the 1990s, Parma had a team to match the best in Italy, with players like Gianfranco Zola, Hernan Crespo and Gianluigi Buffon.

Then, in 2003, came the bankruptcy of the local dairy giant Parmalat and the criminal investigation into its owners, the Tanzi family, who also owned Parma AC. The scandal, Italy's Enron, left the Parmensi crestfallen and the club extinct. New club Parma FC struggled without the Tanzi money, narrowly avoiding relegation in 2004/05.

However, hopes are high that the club's fabled youth set-up can deliver the goods. So visit the friendly Ennio Tardini stadium (a proper football ground, with no running track), where you can still see the big guns of Serie A, and then amble around the delightfully compact city centre, a few hundred yards away.