At the risk of sounding like a know-nothing newbie (which, to some extent, I am), I would like to know what team to root for. I recently did some research and found out that my family hails from the Molise region, Cercamaggiore to be precise. As a person who knows next to nothing about Serie A, I was wondering if someone could let me know who my "home team", STS, is (and a little about them, or a link for more info). Any help would be greatly appreciated.
Hm, that's a good question. The biggest club in Molise is probably Campobasso, and they're in C2. Foggia is the nearest club to be in Serie A in recent years, but I think they may have sunk to C2 as well. Pescara is up the coast a bit; they're in Serie B. Probably, the folks there do what most southern Italians do - they either follow Napoli (Serie B) or one of the big clubs. Rome is the current nearest city with a Serie A club to Molise, so if you're just going on geographical distance, then it'd be Roma or Lazio (NEVER both!). Or, you can use some of the discussions in the following thread to pick a team: https://www.bigsoccer.com/forum/showthread.php?threadid=72876
Oh, I wouldn't go that far. They have an eccentric (to use a kind word) owner, but they have a hell of a coach (Serse Cosmi). And they're underdogs. No offense, Excape Goat, but I'd rather see them win than Milan, for sure. And that's despite the ill will I felt toward them for beating Juventus in that downpour a few years ago. But .... looking at a map, Molise is definitely closer to Rome than to Perugia.
As I mentioned in another thread, I don't hate teams anymore. I generally like seeing all Italian teams do well in Europe although I was a little bit amused by Milan's stumble the other day.
last thing a molisano is expected to do is to root for a team from Apulia; there's a fierce rivalry,when not bad blood between the two people
It's hard to believe now, but Foggia was a damn good team going back about 10 years or so. They achieved quite a lot for such a modest side, with Zeman coaching the team and players like Signori, Kolyvanov, Shalimov, Bryan Roy, etc. It's a shame that they've dropped so far down.
Foggia are in Serie C1 this year, they were promoted from C2 last season. They have a good team and a very good coach. Who knows ? They may even be back to Serie B soon.
Sorry to bug you guys again, but where can I find basic info on Roma? I tried thier official site, but I don't understand enough Italian yet to understand it. I appreciate your help.
http://www.channel4.com/sport/football_italia/alatest.html The above should do the trick and all in English - but don't think big football is about passion not trophy's and the tifosi of the smaller clubs have far more passion for their teams than the glory hunters in the big camps Ciao
I basically agree with your statement. As someone else - Parmigiano, I checked before - noticed on these threads, going to see games in smaller cities is always great, cause you can find a true, genuine atmosphere, made with people born and raised in a city that love and cheer their own hometown side. It's a different passion and people get much more involved in it. Beside that, as quoted, no glory hunters in these stadiums, only true passionate fans!
Great questions, NGV. You are right when you say many people (well the main part) have more than one club loyalty: the magic number is 2, your hometown team and one of the top-ever teams (which basically, in Italy, are: Inter, Juventus, Milan and Napoli. I could add even Fiorentina, Lazio, Roma and Torino, which belong to italian football history, but have less fans than the fab-4 above). People with a 2 teams heart usually give the main spot to the team doing better, that obvious: but it's very difficult (I could say, impossible, between true fans at least) to find someone so "temerarious" to deny his previous team, just because the team sucks. People can change girlfriend, brand of beer, cars, religion too: but changing football side, that's almost a wonder! I never noticed Inter-Milan, or Juve-Torino or Lazio-Roma or Modena-Bologna exchanges, too far away from football fans mind. As "why" people support this or that great team (not talking about hometown clubs), well tough question with multiple answers. Some, because your parent(s) did support (and this is the main group, imho); some, because when you were growing up, that team was the winning side ... You could define even some geographical areas: Turin, as urban area, is mainly for Torino, not for Juve. In Lombardia, a region with Inter & Milan, there are lots of Juventus fans. In the south, Puglia is for Inter, Calabria for Juve and many other examples ... In a word, choosing a football team is a hard, one way choice!