Inter Milan have been awarded last season's Serie A title despite finishing third behind Juventus and AC Milan, the Italian football federation (FIGC) announced on Wednesday.
The move comes after both Juve and Milan were sanctioned by the federation for their part in a match-fixing scandal.
The FIGC submitted a statement explaining their decision.
"In the case of sanctions that establish a change in the standings, such as penalty points or the retrograding to last place ... there are provisions to automatically attribute the Italian title to the team that becomes top of the standings," said the statement.
Juventus topped the original table ahead of Milan but with Juve relegated, and docked 17 points from the coming season, over their part in the scandal and Milan docked 30 points from last season and eight for the forthcoming campaign, that left Inter top of the tree.
Several people had called for this year's title to be unattributed, as is the case with last year's title of which Juventus were also stripped.
painful wait
But Inter owner Massimo Moratti demanded that his side be awarded last season's title, thus ending their long, painful, 17-year wait for the scudetto, claiming they deserved it as they had not cheated.
Inter have thus been awarded their 14th title, although quite what that means to the players who finished 15 points behind their Juve counterparts last season, remains to be seen.
On Tuesday night the FIGC's disciplinary tribunal reduced the sentences meted out to the four guilty clubs, with Fiorentina and Lazio reinstated in Serie A, although with greater points deductions than they would have faced in Serie B; Juve had their points deduction in Serie B cut from 30 to 17 points and Milan saw their Serie A deficit cut from 15 to eight points.
All that leaves Inter and Roma with direct qualification to the Champions League this coming season with Chievo and, for the moment, Milan playing in the qualifying rounds.
Palermo, Livorno and Parma are in the UEFA Cup, although UEFA were expected to make a decision on Milan's Champions League participation on Thursday, with Palermo poised for promotion to Europe's premier competition and Empoli hoping for a UEFA Cup ticket if Milan get banned.
Lens chairman Gervais Martel has called on European soccer chiefs to stand firm and bar corruption-tainted AC Milan from taking part in next season's UEFA Champions League.
Martel -- who has called for his club to be promoted to the club competition as a fourth French entrant -- said it would be "incredible" for Milan to be allowed to take part after their involvement in Italy's match-fixing scandal.
Milan could be admitted into the third round of preliminary qualifying for the Champions League after a successful appeal hearing in Rome on Tuesday. UEFA were expected to rule on the Italian giants admissibility at an emergency hearing yesterday.
But Martel has said UEFA should send a message that cheating would not be tolerated by barring Milan from Europe's premier club competition.
"I hope that UEFA don't let AC Milan into the competition," Martel said. "It would be incredible that a team who has been stripped of their runners-up finish from last year is allowed to take part."
Martel was scathing of the corruption scandal that has rocked Serie A.
"The last trial proved that the Italian Championship was faked. Now with the waving of a magic wand, they are saying that Milan can take part in the Champions League qualifiers," he added.
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