Albion boss Roberto Di Matteo has admitted Italian football must play catch-up to match the pace of England and Spain.

The Baggies head coach says football in his homeland has fallen behind the powerhouses of La Liga and the Premier League since the halcyon days of Serie A dominance in the early-90s.

And he says Italian domestic football must modernise to keep up with the top leagues in England and Spain.

“I wouldn’t be too harsh,” said the former Italy international. “A number of Italian clubs have won the Champions League in recent years. But football as a brand and product has lost its appeal a bit in Italy.

“When you go to stadia, the security isn’t good enough and the infrastructure isn’t good enough.

“You pay for a show so you want to be comfortable and feel safe. Money talks. In the early 90s all the best players were in Italy.

“If you look now the best are in La Liga, England or even the Bundesliga. We did, however, win the World Cup.”

And Di Matteo admitted the Italian second tier, Serie B, is lagging a long way behind the English Championship, which often now attracts attendances bigger than some games in the Italian top-flight. “Serie A has been in turmoil in terms of people going to games, so Serie B will be even lower,” said the Hawthorns chief.

“The teams aren’t as big as those in the Championship.

“They do want to apply the same model but, in Italy, they will need to start from scratch, upgrade the stadium and infrastructure and make them more consumer-friendly to get people into the stadia.

“If you look at the clubs involved in the Championship, they are generally big.

“Derby get 30,000 people in and there is Sheffield United, ourselves, Cardiff, Middlesbrough, Forest – you look at them and they are massive. Some are bigger than clubs in the Premier League now.”