The story between Potenza and Catanzaro is an intertwined story, regional capitals of often forgotten lands that try to seek their own redemption in football, not only sporting but also social; two clubs that have been trying to re-emerge for years and which perhaps, thanks to their respective presidents, can now dream of dusting off the glories of the past, Serie A for Catanzaro and who knows, Serie B for the Lucanians.
The relationship between the two fans has its roots already in the early 90s, when both the West of Potenza and that of Catanzaro were hit by serious mourning; Fiorino, on the Potenza side, Massimo Capraro, on the Giallorossi side, were leading exponents of their respective curves, two ultras who left too soon and whose names are still present in drapes and choirs that Lucan and Calabrian offer around Italy; in those years showing solidarity was not such an obvious gesture, as is the case today, yet the two curves exchanged banners of mutual closeness. Since then Potentini and Catanzaresi have kept the relationship alive, which especially in recent years has become even more welded.
Potenza arrives at today’s match with the faint hope of reaching the playoffs, a goal that until a few Sundays ago seemed pure utopia, while coach Vivarini’s troop is on the hunt for yet another victory in an extraordinary championship but mathematically achieved for some time now . There are almost four thousand spectators (3,887 to be precise), with a conspicuous presence of Calabrian supporters, today also accompanied by the boys from Salzburg. When the respective eleven enter the field, the two sectors are colored with their own social colors, with the Catanzaro players re-proposing the flags used in the first leg match against Potenza.
If the first leg, played precisely on the anniversary of Massimo Capraro’s birthday, was one-way, with the Giallorossi who immediately prevailed with a peremptory 6-1, today’s match is a completely different story; in fact, the hosts manage to win with a suffered but precious 3-2 and thus gain access to the playoffs, where they will face the Picerno cousins, in an all-Lucano derby that already promises a good crowd.
However, today’s match offers other food for thought, regarding a near future that needs to be planned. Floriano Noto on one side and Donato Macchia in Potenza are trying to revive the history of the two clubs, with the former however carrying on with the work bringing the eagles back to Serie B. However, it happens that in the face of important sporting projects , politics shows itself to be unprepared or in any case not very reactive. Both the ceravolo that the Viviani in Potenza are in fact old-fashioned structures, not so ready for the leap of category and if in the capital of Basilicata the idea of building a new plant has now faded, making room instead for a more realistic restyling project to the current one, in Catanzaro there is no what to do has still been decided, even if in the next championship the Giallorossi will probably still play their matches in the old facility, however made compliant with the standards for the category, without however letting the idea of building a stadium wan, in an area far from the center inhabited. During the second half of the game from the Rossoblù West an eloquent banner is raised: “Enough political games, we want the good of Potenza”; in fact, yet another political theater was staged during the week: on the one hand, the rossoblù patron Macchia declared himself willing to continue to bear the costs to make the Viviani (this season the president of the Lucanians completed the modernization works of the current grandstand with his own funds) in exchange, however, for a concession of at least ten years in the use of the stadium, on the other hand he recorded a certain coldness that rossoblù fans see it as an impediment to their own ambitions. The theme of sports facilities is now extremely topical, even more so for the Serie C realities which, not being able to count on the income from TV rights, ask the municipalities to manage the stadiums in order to be able to plan calmly and guarantee themselves additional forms of income .
A topic as thorny as it is important, which has implications not only for sports. Over the years, public bodies, and therefore also municipalities, have shown that they no longer have the human and financial resources to manage their assets, stadiums, palaces or theaters, and have preferred to delegate their management through concession contracts, to private individuals who in return undertake not only to pay a fee to the municipalities themselves, but also to guarantee the maintenance of the asset itself, which however always remains in the availability of the public entity. In the case of football, we all often come across dilapidated structures left to their sad fate, emblematic is the case of Flamineus of Rome, which instead could be recovered thanks to these presidents willing to combine the sporting project with the entrepreneurial one. Ultras is something else, ultras is beyond but today they are also playing in another field and that is why their supervisory task extends to these new fronts. The ultras, as in the case of the Potentini, were able to immediately grasp the centrality of the issue and to place the good of Potenza football at the center of the debate, understood not only as a simple football team, but as a common good, the heritage of the entire community . In the past, Lucanians had already underlined the importance, not only in sports, of their football team; the year was 2009-2010, the rossoblù were now close to being banned due to alleged match-fixing and during the last home match against breaking latest news, they closed their year with an eloquent and current banner: “Potenza is not a sport, it’s not a team, it’s an idea and ideas never die”. As lovers of football and more generally of sport, it is legitimate to ask ourselves what reasons drive politics to ignore the importance that a club has and why we are therefore unable to implement forms of synergy between politics and entrepreneurship by giving life to a marriage of convenience that would give something to both parties, but above all could give moments of joy to the community.
At the end of the triple whistle everyone celebrates, Potenza an unexpected landing in the playoffs, while Catanzaro the promotion to Serie B, conquered in a triumphal way. Now begins the most important game: the future.
Pier Paolo Sacco