It is Easter Sunday at the Beverly Hills residence of Aurelio De Laurentiis, the 76-year-old Italian movie mogul and owner of Serie A team Napoli.

“Soccer will lose the younger generation,” he declares. But De Laurentiis has ideas. Lots of them. And once he starts, there is no stopping him.

“The matches are too long,” he shrugs. He does not like the long breaks caused by video referees. He also cannot understand why 15 minutes is required for half-time.

“Imagine the stupidity!” he says. “You think my grandchild of six years old, who knows everything (about football) because he plays with the PlayStation… he will escape…  and you think you will recoup him after 15 minutes? Never! Because he goes in his room. He starts to play FIFA.”

In the stadiums, he says, children are on board with “the atmosphere and the participation” but, he warns, “they do not have the patience to see a very slow-paced match on television.

“If you watch a match on TV, especially if it is a terrible match… what do they do?”

OK, Mr President. So how long should the game be?

“Number one: I will reduce from 45 minutes each (half) to 25 minutes,” he says. In his 50-minute game, the match will be tracked for in-play time, rather than match officials recovering minutes through stoppages at the end of each half.

“But also you cannot stay down on the field and play around like an actor!”

“AGHHHH!” he moans, feigning injury. “NO — you will go OUT! What I will do also — I will never use a red card and a yellow card.”

Instead, he likes a sin-bin concept. “I would say ‘YOU — get out for five minutes (for a yellow card)!’ And ‘YOU — get out for 20 minutes for a red card!’