Loading player
There are only two football clubs in Italy still competing in all top-level competitions. One is men’s Inter, but realistically they can’t win the championship anymore. The other is women’s Roma, which five years after its foundation can seriously think about winning the Scudetto, is in the final of the Italian Cup for the third consecutive time and will be the only Italian in the quarter-finals of the Champions League.
The commitment that awaits him in the Champions League will be an absolute novelty: the qualification for the quarterfinals, which will play against the Spanish champions Barcelona, has come to his first participation ever. For the occasion, women’s Roma will play the first leg (Tuesday 21 March) at the Stadio Olimpico, where they have never played before.
Top-level Italian women’s football is under development and still lives on moments. So far it has been Juventus’ moment, which in its six years of existence has won almost everything possible, but now, a bit like what happened in the men’s game, it is experiencing a moment of decline. And before that there was Fiorentina, the first team born as a real women’s division of the reference men’s club that everyone knows.
These two teams have won the last six Scudettos, but have recently been joined by other competitors, more or less equipped to do so. Among these, none has reached as far as Roma, who have already started winning and can now think of aiming for the most coveted prizes.
After Zara Kramzar’s goal against Sampdoria (Marco Luzzani/Getty Images)
In 2018 AS Roma acquired the sporting title – that is the right to participate in a specific championship, in this case Serie A – of Res, an already existing local club, to establish its own women’s team. Under the then American ownership headed by James Pallotta, Roma was organized starting from a group of players inherited from the Res reinforced with international players and others from the Italian Serie A, including Elisa Bartoli: Roman, raised in a Roman club , who became (and still is) the first captain.
The responsibility of the new women’s Roma was entrusted to Elisabetta Bavagnoli, a former player and coach, for years a collaborator of Carolina Morace, with whom she formed the first women’s technical staff in a men’s team, at the Viterbese in 1999. In the initial three seasons of the women’s Roma, Bavagnoli was more than just a coach and her experience helped set up a completely new company from scratch. On the pitch, then, you led the team to two fourth-place finishes in the league and to victory in the 2021 Coppa Italia, their first trophy.
Bavagnoli’s role then changed with the takeover of Roma’s new American owners, the Friedkin group, which confirmed the plans and reinvigorated the ambitions of its women’s division. As part of a subsequent reorganization, Bavagnoli was offered the role of head of the entire women’s sector, while her position as coach was entrusted to an emerging coach, Alessandro Spugna, sixth with Empoli in his first season in A league.
Elisabetta Bavagnoli (Tullio M. Puglia/Getty Images)
This reorganization is believed to underlie the marked improvements seen over the past two seasons. Roma finished second in the league last year, five points behind Juventus, after 17 wins in 22 matches. Played another Coppa Italia final and qualified for the Champions League for the first time.
Last year’s performances have continued, and improved, this season, to which Roma have arrived with an even more ready and competitive squad. On the one hand there is a lot of experience spread evenly throughout the group. Elisa Bartoli, Elena Linari, Valentina Giacinti and Manuela Giugliano are also regular appearances for the Italian national team; Andressa Alves, Carina Wenninger and newcomer Victoria Losada are players of international level and come from the best European clubs. To their experience is added the talent of the younger ones: above all Annamaria Serturini, Giada Greggi and the Japanese Moeka Minami.
This moment of affirmation of women’s Roma is attracting attention from all sides, including those of the municipality of Rome, which would seem willing to support their needs to keep them in the city even for the most important matches. In fact, adequately equipped sports facilities are scarce in Rome and the few that exist do not meet all the requirements required, for example by UEFA, to be able to host European matches.
The Tre Fontane grandstand (Getty Images)
Women’s Roma play at Tre Fontane, the stadium in the EUR district that is rented from a third-party club and is also used by the men’s youth teams. Over the last few years a good atmosphere has been created at the Tre Fontane and the following is one of the largest in the women’s championship, but the system has obvious shortcomings. There is no lighting and therefore it is not possible to play at night; there are also no numbered seats, which are required by UEFA for European matches. For all these reasons, Roma only play during the day at home, and cup matches are played in Latina, an hour’s drive from Tre Fontane.
The quarter-finals against Barcelona which will be played at the Olimpico will therefore be an opportunity to consolidate the presence of women’s Roma in the city and attract new fans: for now, between 30 and 40 thousand spectators are expected, also thanks to the concessions granted to the public of the masculine. For the team, the commitment will be considerable, given that Barcelona women, founded in 1988, is one of the strongest in Europe and won the tournament two years ago. Regardless of the outcome, however, the confrontation will be another stage in a journey that has just begun, like has explained Bavagnoli: «We could perform a sporting miracle or not, but seeing our women’s team so high at an international level is a pride for the whole club».
This weekend the championship will resume, the first in Italy played by professional women’s teams, which has changed format for the occasion. There was a first phase, a sort of regular season, which Roma finished first with 8 points ahead of the second. This advantage will be maintained in the second phase, the so-called “poule Scudetto”, in which the top five classified will face each other in a group between them which will ultimately establish the champion team of Italy and the two qualified for the next Champions League.
Furthermore, the date of the final of the Coppa Italia remains to be established, which Roma will play against Juventus in a rematch of both the last edition and the last Super Cup, won by Roma last November.