alwaysazzurri
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This is my favourite story about the Milan derby, even though its written by an Inter fan... really transports you to the San Siro in 1970s, you can almost see Rivera!!
(This story is not intended to be a legally binding non-fiction story - specially when it concerns the blow-by-blow events of the football games themselves. Please do not hold me to the exact minute and scorer of games held about 4 decades ago! Thanks - Paul "The Riffster")
Many American teenagers associate November with the leaves falling off the trees, with the family getting together for Thanksgiving, with going to football games wrapped in blankets with mugs of hot cider to keep one warm.
Not for me. But I didn't miss out on *anything*. Not that I don't like leaves changing colours and the wonderful Thanksgiving feast and family get-together.
But I was in Milan, Italy as an American teenager.
I thought of November as foggy mist around the Duomo, as buying a farcito tost in the subway tabaccheria – con carciofi (with artichoke) if you please - so you could not only enjoy a tasty sandwich, but warm your hands as well! November was riding the Metropolitana (simply known as the "Metro") to school and to locations around the city. It was the sparks shooting off the electric tram lines at night, it was the hot chestnut vendors in the Piazza Cordusio. There was even an organ grinder man with a real monkey -- something I never thought I would see in real life! "Novembre" was all this and more....
.....but most of all, November was football.
Calcio.
Football!
And football in Milan is a crown jewel of the city. Along with the great opera center, La Scala, along with one of the world's fashion centers located on the Via Montenapoleone, along with the constant thrumming of business deals of the "borsa", the stock exchange. Along with the towering presence of the ornate gothic cathedral called simply "Il Duomo", the symbol of the city.
Football was part and parcel of Milanese life. It was discussed everywhere at anytime by virtually everybody. You could hear it being talked about anywhere. But my favourite place to open up a copy of the Guerin Sportivo or to argue with a friend on the latest Italian National team controversy was the Galleria. THE Galleria folks, not some fake southern California yuppie spinoff.
It stands next to the Duomo, a stately elegance of ornate glass, tile and lights called the Galleria Vittorio Emmanuale, an enclosed promenade that may have been the world's first indoor shopping mall, and is certainly still its most wonderful. Nothing beats talking about football, or art, or politics, or just plain people watching in the Galleria.*
I guess you can tell that I liked Milano - not pretty like a Como or Orvieto or even Roma, it was not glamorous unless you are 'fashionable', but definitely a very livable city and one that never lacks for goings-on.
Football in November in Milan was me playing the game for the American School of Milan. For playing (and sometimes even winning) games as a defender and then as a keeper. But really November to me was being a fan of Internazionale of Milano, the "nerazzurri."
One of the world's most powerful football teams in a city where some of the finest football the world has ever seen has been played. A city with a sharp divide between its two teams - Inter and arch-rival AC Milan. The nerazzurri (the black and blue) against their deadly enemies - the rossoneri (the red and black). Rivalry isn't enough to describe the gulf between fans of these teams! In fact, the word doesn't even come close.
Inter and Milan shared an almost complete lock on the Italian football scene with Juventus, the "bianconeri". "Juve" as they were often known as, were one of the two main teams of Milan's sister industrial city of the north, Turin. Together, the triumvirate of Juve, Milan and Inter were - and still are - called "i grandi" (the great ones).
No other team, no matter how talented, is given that title except for these teams. Along with Juve's archrival team, Torino, these teams have won 80% of Italy's "scudetti" (championships) in the top football league in Italy, Serie A (A Series, or A League). A virtual hegemony of power was shared amongst these three teams.
Football sports rivalries in Italy aren't like their brethren in the States. True, in Chicago you will find the odd Cub or Sox fan that almost foams at the mouth when talking about the crosstown rival team. But in Italy the crosstown rivalries (which are sometimes even regional, like Bologna and Firenze) are much, much more heated.
Inter-Milan, Juve-Torino (despite the descent of the once-proud "Granata" into the second league in Italy, Serie B), and Roma-Lazio were the biggest of these crosstown rivalries, or "Derby" as they were called in Italy. You can only compare these rivalries to their brethren in Europe and South American and also to ones growing in Asia and Africa.
A Derby in Italy (and in most of the rest of Europe as well) is not a minor matter. It isn't just fans jeering each other for an afternoon, followed by a year of benign behaviour. Oh no, it is far, far more than that.
It is engrained in the Italian football fan's psyche to root for one's team, but it is even more deeply engrained that one must hate the team's archrival with a passion that is only approached by the passionate love that Italians usually reserve just for wine, food, music, and the opposite sex (not necessarily in that order of course!)
It isn't just the Yankees against the Mets, it isn't just the Bears against the Packers, it isn't just Ohio State against Michigan, this is a bitter and longstanding rivalry now 90 years old. The "ultras" (hardcore fans) of the teams are at all times passionate about their teams. These clubs of usually quite young men have names, usually in English words (probably because of again the English tradition of the game and the newer, somewhat American influence of being more cool or modern because of using an english word) are named "Commandos", "Vikings", "Boys", "Fossa dei Leoni" (Italian for Lion's Den), "Fossa dei Serpenti" (Snake pit) - and they are NOT for the faint of heart. If you sit in or around one of the areas that contain these fans expect to stand for most if not all the game and expect to listen to a cacophony of singing, yelling, horn-playing (sometimes with huge truck horns powered by batteries - the infamous 'klaxons' you hear at every Derby,)
da-da-DA-da da-da-DA-da da-da-DA-da
da-da-DA-da da-da-DA-da da-da-DA-da
da-da-DA-da da-da-DA-da....
Most of all, expect your vision to be blocked from time to time by dozens, hundreds, even thousands of flags and banners proclaiming love for one's team or hatred for the rival. It is wise indeed to have a flag of your own even if you aren't a big fan. Just make sure that you are sitting in the right section! But more about *that* matter about ultras later on....
Some ultras are merely very passionate, other bound into the criminal. Suffice it to say that an Inter fan does not sit in a Milan ultra section, nor does a Milan fan do the same in an Inter ultra section. Not unless you are insane or a very pretty young female. VERY pretty!
So November in Milan for me was walking down the hallways of my school with my Inter book-bag, saying a hearty 'Forza Inter' to fellow Interisti, and an equally hearty 'Milan di Mer..." to the wretched Milanisti among the student population. But our friendship with chants shared with other Inter fans and the rivalry and taunts thrown at the Milan fans in the school halls was incredibly muted compared to the electric atmosphere of the Stadio San Siro, The Saint Cyril Stadium.
San Siro is not a pretty stadium -- but along with Wembley, Maracana, and a few dozen other edifices, it is one of the world capitals of football. A "must visit" for any true (and sufficiently wealthy) fan of the game. It looms out of the fog on the southwest side of the city. It's grounds break up the monotonous rows of towering apartment buildings that house some of the nearly two million people of the northern Italian Industrial city.
The stadium when I was a boy was slightly different looking than it is now - thanks to "improvements" made for the 1990 World Cup in which larger entrance ramps and more modern facilities were installed. All in all though, the improvements made the rather plain colossus of a stadium (almost 80,000 seated in it) into a truly ugly behemoth sitting in the "periferia" (the periphery, or outer zone) of Milano.
But you didn't come to San Siro to admire its architecture, you came to admire your favourite team destroying the opposition, preferably the team from across town. You came to see the likes of Alessandro Mazzola (called Sandro, Sandrino or "il baffo" – the mustachioed one - by Inter fans.) Mazzola had wondrous ball control talent in his slight frame. He hardly looked the part of the talented athlete, but he remains one of Italy's best football players of all time.
You came to see the elegant tall figure of Giacinto Facchetti striding up from the defense to make powerful counterattacks, the rocky face and even more rugged game of bulwark defender Tarcisio Burgnich, the bowl-like mop atop Roberto Boninsegna (Bonin-SEGNA! - a play on words in Italian meaning
Bonin-SCORES! as "segnare" is Italian to "score"), or the speed of Jair Da Costa, the Brasilian winger.
If you were Milanista, you came to San Siro to see Romeo Benetti, the defending midfielder who possessed a cannon-like kick, you came to see Albertosi, the graceful goalkeeper who was battling with Dino Zoff for a starting spot on the national team, or Karl-Heinz Schnellinger, the tough German national defender.
But mostly a Milan fan came to see Gianni Rivera....Continued at http://footballspeak.com/post/2011/07/11/Fury-in-the-Fog-Part-1.aspx
(This story is not intended to be a legally binding non-fiction story - specially when it concerns the blow-by-blow events of the football games themselves. Please do not hold me to the exact minute and scorer of games held about 4 decades ago! Thanks - Paul "The Riffster")
Many American teenagers associate November with the leaves falling off the trees, with the family getting together for Thanksgiving, with going to football games wrapped in blankets with mugs of hot cider to keep one warm.
Not for me. But I didn't miss out on *anything*. Not that I don't like leaves changing colours and the wonderful Thanksgiving feast and family get-together.
But I was in Milan, Italy as an American teenager.
I thought of November as foggy mist around the Duomo, as buying a farcito tost in the subway tabaccheria – con carciofi (with artichoke) if you please - so you could not only enjoy a tasty sandwich, but warm your hands as well! November was riding the Metropolitana (simply known as the "Metro") to school and to locations around the city. It was the sparks shooting off the electric tram lines at night, it was the hot chestnut vendors in the Piazza Cordusio. There was even an organ grinder man with a real monkey -- something I never thought I would see in real life! "Novembre" was all this and more....
.....but most of all, November was football.
Calcio.
Football!
And football in Milan is a crown jewel of the city. Along with the great opera center, La Scala, along with one of the world's fashion centers located on the Via Montenapoleone, along with the constant thrumming of business deals of the "borsa", the stock exchange. Along with the towering presence of the ornate gothic cathedral called simply "Il Duomo", the symbol of the city.
Football was part and parcel of Milanese life. It was discussed everywhere at anytime by virtually everybody. You could hear it being talked about anywhere. But my favourite place to open up a copy of the Guerin Sportivo or to argue with a friend on the latest Italian National team controversy was the Galleria. THE Galleria folks, not some fake southern California yuppie spinoff.
It stands next to the Duomo, a stately elegance of ornate glass, tile and lights called the Galleria Vittorio Emmanuale, an enclosed promenade that may have been the world's first indoor shopping mall, and is certainly still its most wonderful. Nothing beats talking about football, or art, or politics, or just plain people watching in the Galleria.*
I guess you can tell that I liked Milano - not pretty like a Como or Orvieto or even Roma, it was not glamorous unless you are 'fashionable', but definitely a very livable city and one that never lacks for goings-on.
Football in November in Milan was me playing the game for the American School of Milan. For playing (and sometimes even winning) games as a defender and then as a keeper. But really November to me was being a fan of Internazionale of Milano, the "nerazzurri."
One of the world's most powerful football teams in a city where some of the finest football the world has ever seen has been played. A city with a sharp divide between its two teams - Inter and arch-rival AC Milan. The nerazzurri (the black and blue) against their deadly enemies - the rossoneri (the red and black). Rivalry isn't enough to describe the gulf between fans of these teams! In fact, the word doesn't even come close.
Inter and Milan shared an almost complete lock on the Italian football scene with Juventus, the "bianconeri". "Juve" as they were often known as, were one of the two main teams of Milan's sister industrial city of the north, Turin. Together, the triumvirate of Juve, Milan and Inter were - and still are - called "i grandi" (the great ones).
No other team, no matter how talented, is given that title except for these teams. Along with Juve's archrival team, Torino, these teams have won 80% of Italy's "scudetti" (championships) in the top football league in Italy, Serie A (A Series, or A League). A virtual hegemony of power was shared amongst these three teams.
Football sports rivalries in Italy aren't like their brethren in the States. True, in Chicago you will find the odd Cub or Sox fan that almost foams at the mouth when talking about the crosstown rival team. But in Italy the crosstown rivalries (which are sometimes even regional, like Bologna and Firenze) are much, much more heated.
Inter-Milan, Juve-Torino (despite the descent of the once-proud "Granata" into the second league in Italy, Serie B), and Roma-Lazio were the biggest of these crosstown rivalries, or "Derby" as they were called in Italy. You can only compare these rivalries to their brethren in Europe and South American and also to ones growing in Asia and Africa.
A Derby in Italy (and in most of the rest of Europe as well) is not a minor matter. It isn't just fans jeering each other for an afternoon, followed by a year of benign behaviour. Oh no, it is far, far more than that.
It is engrained in the Italian football fan's psyche to root for one's team, but it is even more deeply engrained that one must hate the team's archrival with a passion that is only approached by the passionate love that Italians usually reserve just for wine, food, music, and the opposite sex (not necessarily in that order of course!)
It isn't just the Yankees against the Mets, it isn't just the Bears against the Packers, it isn't just Ohio State against Michigan, this is a bitter and longstanding rivalry now 90 years old. The "ultras" (hardcore fans) of the teams are at all times passionate about their teams. These clubs of usually quite young men have names, usually in English words (probably because of again the English tradition of the game and the newer, somewhat American influence of being more cool or modern because of using an english word) are named "Commandos", "Vikings", "Boys", "Fossa dei Leoni" (Italian for Lion's Den), "Fossa dei Serpenti" (Snake pit) - and they are NOT for the faint of heart. If you sit in or around one of the areas that contain these fans expect to stand for most if not all the game and expect to listen to a cacophony of singing, yelling, horn-playing (sometimes with huge truck horns powered by batteries - the infamous 'klaxons' you hear at every Derby,)
da-da-DA-da da-da-DA-da da-da-DA-da
da-da-DA-da da-da-DA-da da-da-DA-da
da-da-DA-da da-da-DA-da....
Most of all, expect your vision to be blocked from time to time by dozens, hundreds, even thousands of flags and banners proclaiming love for one's team or hatred for the rival. It is wise indeed to have a flag of your own even if you aren't a big fan. Just make sure that you are sitting in the right section! But more about *that* matter about ultras later on....
Some ultras are merely very passionate, other bound into the criminal. Suffice it to say that an Inter fan does not sit in a Milan ultra section, nor does a Milan fan do the same in an Inter ultra section. Not unless you are insane or a very pretty young female. VERY pretty!
So November in Milan for me was walking down the hallways of my school with my Inter book-bag, saying a hearty 'Forza Inter' to fellow Interisti, and an equally hearty 'Milan di Mer..." to the wretched Milanisti among the student population. But our friendship with chants shared with other Inter fans and the rivalry and taunts thrown at the Milan fans in the school halls was incredibly muted compared to the electric atmosphere of the Stadio San Siro, The Saint Cyril Stadium.
San Siro is not a pretty stadium -- but along with Wembley, Maracana, and a few dozen other edifices, it is one of the world capitals of football. A "must visit" for any true (and sufficiently wealthy) fan of the game. It looms out of the fog on the southwest side of the city. It's grounds break up the monotonous rows of towering apartment buildings that house some of the nearly two million people of the northern Italian Industrial city.
The stadium when I was a boy was slightly different looking than it is now - thanks to "improvements" made for the 1990 World Cup in which larger entrance ramps and more modern facilities were installed. All in all though, the improvements made the rather plain colossus of a stadium (almost 80,000 seated in it) into a truly ugly behemoth sitting in the "periferia" (the periphery, or outer zone) of Milano.
But you didn't come to San Siro to admire its architecture, you came to admire your favourite team destroying the opposition, preferably the team from across town. You came to see the likes of Alessandro Mazzola (called Sandro, Sandrino or "il baffo" – the mustachioed one - by Inter fans.) Mazzola had wondrous ball control talent in his slight frame. He hardly looked the part of the talented athlete, but he remains one of Italy's best football players of all time.
You came to see the elegant tall figure of Giacinto Facchetti striding up from the defense to make powerful counterattacks, the rocky face and even more rugged game of bulwark defender Tarcisio Burgnich, the bowl-like mop atop Roberto Boninsegna (Bonin-SEGNA! - a play on words in Italian meaning
Bonin-SCORES! as "segnare" is Italian to "score"), or the speed of Jair Da Costa, the Brasilian winger.
If you were Milanista, you came to San Siro to see Romeo Benetti, the defending midfielder who possessed a cannon-like kick, you came to see Albertosi, the graceful goalkeeper who was battling with Dino Zoff for a starting spot on the national team, or Karl-Heinz Schnellinger, the tough German national defender.
But mostly a Milan fan came to see Gianni Rivera....Continued at http://footballspeak.com/post/2011/07/11/Fury-in-the-Fog-Part-1.aspx
