The Italian Football Association (FIGC) is to be placed into administration after elections for a new president failed on Monday.
Gabriele Gravina, Cosimo Sibilia, and Damiano Tommasi were all up for election, but after four rounds of votes, none were able to obtain an outright majority.
As a result, the FIGC is now set to be managed by the Italian Olympic Committee (CONI), of which it is an affiliate, until new, successful elections are held.
CONI president Giovanni Malago will consequently also assume temporary responsibility for FIGC affairs.
Gravina was marginally behind Cosimo Sibilia in the first three votes, when a majority of three quarters, two thirds and 50+1 respectively was not obtained, with Damiano Tommasi each time picking up in the region of 20 percent of the vote.
A fourth round of voting -- this time without Tommasi -- was therefore necessary, but the president of the Italian Professional Footballers' Association's (AIC) votes did not go to either Sibilia or Gravina, with his backers instead voiding their votes for an alternative.
Sibilia also called on his backers to desert the vote, saying that there were "no conditions to proceed," leading to no overall majority with Gravina attaining 39.06 percent and Sibilia 1.85 percent, with 59.09 percent declared void.
Italian football will, therefore, have to wait a little longer to discover who will replace Carlo Tavecchio, who tendered his resignation following Italy's failure to qualify for the World Cup.
Tavecchio spent three and a half years at the helm, having been elected ahead of Demetrio Albertini in an election after Giancarlo Abete resigned following Italy's elimination in the group stage of the 2014 World Cup.
Gravina became president of the Lega Pro -- responsible for the Italian leagues from the third division down -- in 2015. The businessman's first involvement in football came between 1984 and 1996 when he was president of the Abruzzo village club Castel di Sangro, who created one of Italian football's greatest fairy tales by climbing to Serie B thanks to five promotions in the space of a decade.
Sibilia was looking to follow in the footsteps of Tavecchio, who also moved up from president of the Italian Amateur Football Association (LND) to become FIGC president.
Tommasi, who enjoyed the support of the professional footballers he represents, was looking to breathe new life into the FIGC as the youngest candidate in the election, but it is not clear whether he will stand again when new elections are called.
"It has all been a waste of time, as I predicted," said Napoli president Aurelio De Laurentiis, following the fourth vote, reports Il Corriere dello Sport. "I knew it would end like this. Football needs to be reconstructed from its foundations."