Throwing Grosetto to the Lions

Attended my very first Florentine soccer match yesterday. Along with 3000 of my closest friends, I merged into the steady throng of afternoon revelers, after downing a quick post-pranzo coffee at the little gelateria in the piazza near my house. I think I am becoming addicted to Sicilian Pistachio….but that is another story.

Resembling salmon, on our way to spawn, we all wriggle our way up Viale de Mille towards the same common goal, the slightly worn, “D shaped cement bowl which is the gem of Tuscany’s sporting extravaganza……Il Stadio!!!!!!! The people around me, men and boys mostly, with an occasional dedicated girlfriend or spouse, are jovial and good spirited. And even if this young Florentine team is ranked in a lower division than her bankrupt older sister, Viola seems to be holding her own with respect to suitors and admirers

Without a ticket, I am not even sure I will get in, but the sky is blue and the sun bakes nicely warm upon my cheeks, so warm that by the time I walk the twenty minutes it takes to get there, I am already shedding my coat and scarf. Spring has arrived to Florence a bit early, and the city is still awash in yellow flowers picked by everyone the day before for woman’s day.

All around me there are purple flags and scarves, all gladly proclaiming that despite the mistakes of the previous team financiers, the Florentine fans are loyally proud of their place in Italian soccer history. So much so, in fact, that after standing in the tightest queue every seen, I just barely manage to purchase one of the few remaining nosebleed tickets before the box office closes, sold out.

As I wind my way up the circular stairs to the top of the stadium, I am reminded of the sounds a bee colony makes. That constant hum one hears just outside the woods that tells you that somewhere just ahead, you will come up upon a hive. Following the buzz, I round the top of the stairs just in time to see Grosetto’s players, Florence’s competitor in this match, come out on the field.

Almost immediately the atmosphere changes and I begin to understand, even if 2000 years late, just what the gladiators must have felt, walking out into the coliseum sunlight to the roar of its bloodthirsty onlookers. And while there isn’t any true malevolence here, the mood is definitely set. This isn’t just fun and games, this is Italian soccer and every match played, means a step up or down in the hotly contested rankings where a player’s fast and agile feet can bring him the smiles of pretty young girls, sportive endorsements, and a pocketful of euros.

As the game begins on the field, so too, does the show in Fiesole curve, the cheap seat season ticket section, where Florence’s most loyal (if not wealthy) supporters put on a show surely rival to even the opening of the Olympic Games. With timed precision, their banners spell out both words of encouragement and crude innuendo. And smiling with new awareness I begin to understand what friends meant when they say “if you want to learn the Italian language, the stadium is a place to get the basics!”

And so I sit and listen and add new polish to my list of curses outlining the male anatomy and what someone’s mother can do for a side business when not selling bread.

The players are matched pretty evenly and Grosetto scores first, leaving the home team to play fast catch up if they are to save face. Not to disappoint, and in less than three minutes, Viola ties up the match one: one. Like sardines in a can, to my left are three misplaced Grosetto fans, trapped in a sea of screaming purple. They grunt in disgust while the rest of us hoot and make rude hand gestures, (me amongst them) happy to now be in a dead heat instead of lagging behind, a team most Florentine’s feel is the equivalent to a recreational church league.

And so the game progresses, with strategically placed epitaphs, purple smoke, loud rhythmic drumming and occasionally, the kick of a soccer ball. For the focal point of this big event isn’t just about the sport of soccer. Its about the coming together of a community, a way for differences and social classes and religious beliefs to be set aside and for one brief afternoon, everyone in the city remains united and in agreement.

Some say the folks in Florence will turn their backs on this small little upstart team. That as time progresses, the more jaded, hard core fans will form loyalties to the bigger fish, trading in their purple passion for jerseys from other big league cities. I say if you believe that, then you surely don’t know the mentality of the Italian in his native element and you certainly haven’t been to Florence on a Sunday afternoon, sat in her sunny stadium or been bitten by the purple flu……for once she’s in an Etruscan’s veins their blood flows no other color.