Rome-Barcelona, ​​record attendance for women’s football: an evening that has become a legend

by Rita Ricchiuti

When writing an essential page in the history of a specific socio-cultural context, one is rarely aware of what is happening. Time will then be the judge and consecrate a single moment in an eternal story. But on the night of March 21, 2023 one felt the sensation that the face of a reality was changing, that one of those stories that entered the annals as custodians and progenitors of a unique heritage was being written in real time. 39,454 paying spectators filled the stands of the Stadio Olimpico in Rome and for the first time they did so to support the Female Rome.

And you can almost glimpse into the future what will be remembered tonight. Of the first leg of the quarterfinals of Women’s Champions League between Rome and Barcelona it will be said that she took Italian women’s football to a new level by bringing the largest number of spectators ever recorded in the history of this sport in Italy to the stadiums. The exploits of the Giallorossi fans will be told, the unconditional loyalty towards the team colors and those who wear them with honor, the tireless choirs sung a cappella, the flags that lit up the starry sky of Rome and the‘pride of a community without borders.

And of the team it will be written that he kept his promise to leave theanima in the field. The final result won’t count, but a fight whose outcome was ultimately expected, but which they still chose to fight, exceeding all expectations. He will always remember Elisa Bartoli the captain who left his signature in the mythology of Rome; the name of Manuela Giugliano will be repeated, who wore the number 10 on a yellow and red shirt at the Stadio Olimpico for the first time after Francesco Totti; we will talk about Annamaria Serturini, Roman by adoption, but with a Romanist soul from day one because she accompanied Rome from aidea to a certainty.

The heroic rescues of Camelia Ceasar who defied physics and won will be sung and finally it will be said that Andressa Alves and Valentina Giacinti came close to the feat, Carina Wenninger, Moeka Minami and Elena Linari defended own home at any cost, Emilie Haavi, Giada Greggi, Benedetta Glionna, Lucia Di Guglielmo and Vicky Losada have never stopped believing in it. Yes, many times we fail to realize that we are on the verge of change the course of reality, but on March 21, 2023 no one had any doubts that that evening the history of women’s Rome would become a legend.