contact: Jeff Matthews

The following items appeared in the Around Naples Encyclopedia at the dates indicated and are consolidated here in chronological order onto one page to provide a coherent history of the adventures and misadventures of the Naples football (soccer) team since the first entry. This page includes a few entries from the Miscellany pages on the concerns about the San Paolo stadium but does not include the separate items on sports stadiums and early soccer in Naples. 

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Italian professional soccer is built along the principles of one major league, the A league; then, a minor league, the B league; then, the very minor leagues, the C1 and C2 league. Each league has 18 teams; at the end of each season, the last 4 teams in the A league are "sent down" to the B league, and the top four in the B league move up. Similarly, the bottom four in the B league exchange places with the top four in the C1 league, and so forth with C2. In theory, then, even a small-town  team can win its way up from the bottom of the minors through the B league and into the A league, where it, too, will then have a shot at the national title. That seldom happens, but the hope of being just such a "Cinderella" team keeps soccer in small towns going. Conversely, a big-city, once high-and-mighty team such as Naples can lose its way down and out of the A league and into the B league. That happened in the late 1990s to Naples. They struggled back up to the A league for a season and then went down again to the B league. 

The salad days of Neapolitan soccer were in the 1980s and early 90s, a period in which Argentine superstar, Diego Maradona, led Naples to two national championships. In those days, streets on a Sunday afternoon after a home game were either full of flag-waving, horn-tooting celebrations of victory or glum fans wandering slowly home, wondering just what had gone wrong. Fan involvement was intense. 

Things have gone very wrong in the last few years, and any sort of soccer emotion at all is noticeably absent. There are few victories to speak of, and no one seems to care about the defeats. Only a few thousand diehard fans even bothered to show up at the giant San Paolo stadium yesterday to watch Naples play Lecce. It was just as well—it was a 1-1 tie. That draw added one measly point to Naples' total in the league standings (a victory counts 3 points) and left them still mired fourth from the bottom in what is called the "demotion zone". BUT—it is the demotion zone of the B league! Naples is at the gates of true soccer obscurity—the C league, as minor as you can get in Italian professional soccer. 

If Naples goes down to the C league, it will be the first time that has happened since the league system was set up in its current form back in the 1920s. This morning at the local coffee-bar, cynics were joking about being in the C league next season, where they might be able to win a game or two—maybe against that powerhouse team from the island of Ischia. They can play on the beach where the few remaining fans will be able to watch in comfort from the roadside. The certainly won't need San Paolo stadium (photo, above) anymore.

entry Dec. 2002

Those who have listened to sporting events on radio know just how good announcers are at letting you know what's going on down on the field. In soccer: 

"...Rossi takes the pass ... dribbles across midfield... long cross into Bernardi ... in the center ... 20 meters out.....past a defender... 15 meters out.... into the penalty area.... he loses it to Symien ... Symienkie... the Polish defender .... long boot back upfield .... headed back by Renaldo ... foul on Renaldo for pushing off on Stakov ... ridiculous... he didn't touch him! ...oh well... ball back in play at midfield..."

It's generally an efficient and steady, almost breathless, stream of patter with very little "dead" air-time. You can almost see it. That's the point, obviously;if you can't see the field, you want to know what's going on, and there are still radio-trained sportscasters who are good at telling you. Unfortunately, younger announcers, who have grown into their professions as TV broadcasters, are short on the gift of gab. So what, you say? You have the TV screen?  Not necessarily. Naples home-games are blacked out, but a local TV station holds a TV panel discussion during the game. The current debates are all about what's wrong with the team— they can't win any games! (Naples tied Palermo at home, the other day. Another disaster.)

Every few minutes, the panel stops raging and ruminating long enough to switch to the stadium for an update. Since they are not permitted to broadcast any of the actual game, you see no field, no players—just pan shots of the fans—and then shots of  two announcers giving their blow-by-blow: 

"...oh ... look at that.... that was close .....oops....c'mon!... hey, you know, I remember a game in 1998 where ... say, Mario, look at those fans over there... they seem to be setting fire to the stadium... well, back to the studio..."

You not only cannot almost see it; you can't even almost hear it! You are watching others watch the game! In such situations, throwing a chair through a TV screen is no longer the satisfying experience it once was.

The term “Hooligan” apparently derives from an English music hall song of the 1890s describing a rowdy Irish family. It may be a variant spelling of the family name, “Hoolihan” or “Houlihan”. It is not clear if Mark Twain, in The Gilded Age (published in 1873), was using it in a pejorative sense in a reference in that book to a fictitious novel he invented called The Hooligans of Hackensack. In any case, by 1898, the word was used in the British press in its current, generic meaning of “rowdy”. The word got a good work-out in the form of “hooliganism” in the Soviet Union to describe general anti-social, anti-Soviet behavior, such as loafing on street corners and making snide comments about the next 5-year plan. The word has been taken up into Italian (from the English use of “football hooligans”) as a synonym for those roughnecks who show up at soccer matches just to fight and cause trouble. It is more than a bit hypocritical of Italians to choose a foreign term; it’s as if they are saying, “We’re so well-behaved at sporting events that we haven’t even got a word to describe that kind of behavior; therefore, we cannot behave like that.” The linguistic determinism underlying that is dubious. Belay that—it’s wrong, but don’t get me started on the Sapir-Whorf Hypothesis. 

The violence is almost always related to the behavior of fans. They show up in masks so police cameras can’t identify them, carry tire-irons, throw bombs onto the field, and are so prone to violence in the stands that police units have to be stationed strategically to keep opposing rooting sections apart. International soccer events can be particularly egregious, as if the fans were acting on some bizarre paraphrase of Clausewitz: “Sports is the continuation of war by other means.” (“Maybe we can’t invade you anymore, but just wait till I get you out in the parking lot!”) Anyone who has ever been to a soccer match in Naples knows that the stadium is always on the verge of boiling over into violent behavior. Just a few weeks ago, a member of a visiting team was stabbed by a fan in the parking lot outside the stadium after the game. True, individual players on the field may fly off the handle sometimes—maybe push, shove, throw a punch, make obscene gestures to each other or even to the crowd, but that is generated by the heat of the moment and is uncommon. 

More to the point, here, is that I don’t know of an episode of collective hooliganism on the part of a team, itself, directed against the other team, the fans, or, say, the referees. Maybe it just goes without saying that adult professional players couldn’t get away with that kind of behavior on the field. The players would certainly be expelled from the game, and —if it really were a case of a whole team being involved— the team could then be banned from the league. 

Kids, on the other hand, can get away with it. There are in Naples, as elsewhere in the world, junior leagues for the young to hone their skills in a variety of sports. There is an active youth soccer league in Naples for 11–and 12–year–olds. The teams bear the names of local neighborhoods in the area, and the game last week was between Bagnolese and Virgilio. The game was apparently heading towards a 3-3 tie, when, in the closing minutes, the referee saw what he judged to be a penalty in the area of the goal. He whistled and gave a free kick on goal. These are a gift and almost always score. 

Since these leagues also serve to train the sports officials of the future, the referee of the game was, himself, only 15. When he called the penalty in favor of the home team, the members of the other team resorted to a typical 12–year–old solution: they swarmed over and beat him up! He had to be rescued by adult bystanders and taken home by his mother. One adult spectator attributed this new kind of “hooliganism” to the tendency of the media to dwell on violence in sports rather than on the game, itself. Kids watch a lot of tv. 

There are any number of things that will cause popular discontent, civil unrest, and marauding bands of pitchfork-bearing peasants to start overturning the king's coaches on the highways. Hunger is one, as is taxation without representation, but in Naples, getting flim-flammed out of your rightful place in the football leagues will do the trick quite nicely. If what happened the other day had happened at any other time of the year, there might have been real trouble. It is no accident that the news broke in the middle of August, when the whole city is somewhere else on vacation, and the few stay-at-homes are sweltering in the worst heat-wave in decades. 

Another entry [top of this page] explains, roughly, how the Italian football leagues are set up. At the end of last season, a couple of months ago, Naples pulled out a couple of victories to finish near the bottom of the "B" football league. True, that is a long, long way from the glories of the 1980s and 90s when the team actually won the "A" league championship twice and was a competitor in most other years, but playing in the "B" league is a lot better than demotion to the "C" league, which is one step above the semi-pro and amateur leagues. That would have happened had Naples not won those few games at the end of last season. So, generally speaking, Naples football fans were, if not happy, at least relieved. 

Now comes the news that the team is to be relegated to the "C" league for next reason due not to anything that happened on the playing field, but to a decision by a judge that the team's "papers" are not in order. In order to take part in the season every year, teams are required to pay a fee. That payment is backed by a third-person guarantor. A judge has determined that, in the case of Naples, the document attesting to the guarantee is invalid due to an invalid signature. 

Such documents are not mere formalities in Italian sports, and there have been cases of entire teams being punished for irregularities. The punishment, in this case, is that Naples is sent down to the "C" league. The open slot in the "B" league will be filled by Catania, the Sicilian team that was contending with Naples last season in the league standings to keep out of last place to avoid being sent down to the "C" league. Naples made it; Catania didn't. Those results have now been reversed by the recent decision. Naples has a very short time —a few days— to appeal the decision, because the playing season is about to start. The crux of the appeal will be, one, that there was nothing wrong with the guarantor's papers and, two, that the judge who ruled against Naples is from Catania. 

The judge in question anticipated some of that in this morning's paper. "It is irrelevant that I am from Catania," he says. "I'm not a sports fan. The last time I set foot in a stadium was in 1974. I'm a judge. I apply the law."

Since I last mentioned the topic, someone has managed to patch up the disastrous situation in the Italian soccer leagues. Naples was on the verge of being relegated to the C-League on the basis of a legal decision about the validity of a signature on a document. That decision was appealed and overturned, which left some people happy, others unhappy, and almost everyone confused. No one seemed to know which teams would go down to the C League and which would be promoted to the B League. As a result of that confusion, several of the B League teams refused to play their opening matches two weeks ago. 

The situation was resolved by trying to make everyone happy; that is, no one would go down to the C League—the B League would just be expanded to include all the would-have-been demotees. So far, so good. Alas, the teams that didn't play the first week have started out somewhat in the hole in the league standings. The scoring rules give a team 3 points for a victory, 1 for a draw and 0 for a loss. The fine print also reads "loss of a point for a forfeit"—that is, refusing to play in the first place. Thus, some teams started out this season with a minus 1. So maybe not everyone was happy, but I did say, "patch up".

Finally, the long nightmare is over. No, not the problem with garbage pick-up, but rather something much more important than public health: I hear by the infernal racket of cheering fans outside on the streets that Naples has finally fought its way back up into the Football A-League. This, after a number of years in the B-League and almost the C-League (which is about as minor league as you can get without wrapping newspaper in tape to use as a ball while you play in a parking lot).

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June 29, 2010

As of this writing, the Argentine national soccer team is doing very well in World Cup play and is expected to do even better. Italy was eliminated a few days ago, so there is a sense of disappointment and "who-to-root-for?" in Italy at large. (I know, sports fans don't understand interrogative object pronouns). But not in Naples. Here, there is no doubt. Argentine flags are cropping up around town, usually accompanied by pictures of Diego Armando Maradona, current coach of the Argentine national team. He played for Naples in the late 1980s and early 1990s, and in the '86/'87 and '89/'90 seasons he led the team to their only Italian A-League championships. He is easily the most popular sports figure ever to be associated with Naples. There is even an organization called Te Diegum (get it?)—thinkers, anthropologists and assorted windbags who sit around and discuss what Maradona continues to mean to the city especially since he has recently said that his ambition is to return to Naples and coach his old team. So, fire up the vuvuzelas; Italy—or at least Naples—is still in this thing.

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Dec 6, 2010

The team is currently in fourth place (out of 20) in the A League. That is good, but not as good as we would like! Naples plays Palermo today; win, lose or draw, they are still doing well in the standings.

The next day: Naples beat Palermo 1-0 in overtime and is now in a tie for third place with Juventus behind second-place Lazio and league-leader Milan.

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(14)

Dec. 20, 2010

Yesterday, Naples pulled into a tie for second place in the A League by beating Lecce, 1-0, in extra-time. (Not the same as "overtime", an entire 15-minute period added on to regulation play in order to avoid ties in World Cup play. Extra-time is a paltry two or three minutes tacked on at the end of a match to make up for time lost during the game from, say, injuries.) The team have won their last three or four games by one goal each, scored in the last few seconds of play. Back in the 1930s, Renato Cesarini, a player for Naples was so good at scoring winning goals in the last few seconds that fans started calling that period "Cesarini time." Fans are now calling it "Mazzarri time" after the trainer of the team. It's a new tradition—a heart-stopping one, to be sure. The thing about traditions, though, is that you have to keep them going.

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Sunday, Feb. 27, 2011

There is some important soccer coming up today and tomorrow (Monday). Currently, with no weekend or Monday matches having yet been played, Milan is in first place with 55 points; Naples is second with 52; Inter is third with 50. The system awards 3 points for a victory, 1 for a tie and 0 for a loss. Inter plays later today (Sunday) and Naples and league-leading Milan go head-to-head tomorrow, obviously a crucial match for both.

Monday, Feb. 28

Inter won; thus, the standings are now (Monday morning): Milan (55), Inter (53), Naples (52) with Milan vs Naples tonight. It's an "away" match in Milan. Although Naples is playing better than they have in 20 years, it has been even longer—1986 to be exact—since they've beaten Milan in Milan. Even the home games have been rough; the two teams met in Naples last October and Naples lost 2-1. A win on Monday evening would put Naples in a tie for first place (at 55 points); a draw would put Naples in a tie with Inter for second place with 53 points (Milan would then have 56); a loss would leave Naples in third place (52) behind Inter (53) and Milan (58), a formidable lead for this late in the season. In the Italian league, each team plays every other team in the league twice, once at home and once away. After tomorrow, there remain about a dozen matches left in the season.  Stay tuned. Tonight at  8.30 pm you will able to herd the entire wildebeest population of the Serengeti National Park through the city of Naples and no one will notice.

Tuesday, Mar 1

Exhilarating! Wildebeest herding, I mean. The match? Total disaster. Milan 3 - Naples 0.


================== update April 28, 2023 ========================

                    The "Scudetto"

Is the scudetto the same as the World Cup? Yes. Approximately. They represent the same thing: the championship
of the Italian Series A soccer league. There really is a physical trophy. It looks gold plated, is all shiny and is what Naples team captain, Giovannu Di Lorenzo, will kiss and hold up when he takes possession of it this week or next. They can't lose. Really, it's in the bag. It's a lock, A lead-pipe cinch. I know you've heard that before,but believe it this time.

The scudetto is a piece of fabric (image below, right), It means "little shield", and is pronounced sku' detto. It's a decoration having the colors of the flag of Italy and is sewn onto the jersey of the Italian sports clubs that won the championship of their sport in the previous season. The scudetto was created in the 1920s to honor the winner of the national association football league (in 1929 rebranded as Serie A). The word "soccer" comes from "association". In Italian the sport is called calcio ("kick"), thus it means "kickball". There are as many scudetti (plural) as there are organized sports leagues in Italy. That's a lot if you want to cover everything —the semiprofessional ambidextrous lesbian badminton league, for example. But when Italians hear scudetto they think of one thing: winning the Serie A soccer league. Sources agree that the inventor of the scudetto was Italian poet Gabriele D'Annunzio. In his youth, D'Annunzio followed soccer. In 1887 he bought a leather ball in London from the manufacturer that supplied English teams and would then kick the ball around with his friends on the beach of his native Pescara. In 1920, the former Austro-Hungarian city of Fiume (now the Croatian Rijeka was annexed to Italy, and D'Annunzio proposed that the local football team acknowledge supporting Italian sovereignty over the city with a tricolored shield of green, white and red on their jerseys. This was in keeping with what Clausewitz forgot to say: Sports are the extension of war by other means.

In 1924, the Italian Football Federation authorized the defending champions to wear the scudetto on their jerseys. The Italian rugby union championship which started in 1928 became the second league to adopt the scudetto on a team's jersey to indicate a title-holding team. Since then, the scudetto has become the symbol of the defending champions of every sports league in Italy. So, Naples is about to win the scudetto. It could happen as early as tomorrow if they win their match and second-place Lazio does not win —meaning even if they draw, it's a lock for Naples. There is no way Naples cannot win the scudetto. You've heard, "Well, you never can tell." Yes, you can. Naples will win the scudetto. Or "In sports anything can happen." No, it can't. Naples will win the scudetto. It will be the third time. The first two were 1986-87 and 1989-90 when Diego Maradona was the team captain. A lot has changed since then: The Maradona is the name of the stadium; it is on Piazza Maradona. But Naples has gone over 30 years since then without winning the scudetto again. His son showed up in Naples for the activities. His father, the eponym for all this, Diego Armando Maradona, died in 2020.


===============added April 30.2023=================

The Vesuvius national park authority in Naples has announced it will be closing access to the live volcano on Saturday, ahead of Napoli’s potential title-winning game on Sunday. Should Lazio drop points against Inter Milan in an earlier kickoff on Sunday, the Italian side could win its first Italian league title in 33 years with victory against Salernitana. Authorities became concerned after reports emerged of plans to use blue smoke bombs and industrial strength fireworks inside the crater, which has been described as a “fragile and intrinsically dangerous place. The Park Authority added that such celebrations would potentially cause damage to people and things, and, in particular, to the flora and fauna of the Vesuvius National Park as well as to the structures and technological systems. The commissioner of the park authority Raffaele De Luca also added, ““Vesuvius crater is a fragile and intrinsically dangerous place. We are all happy for Napoli’s victory which honors the territory and will bring great joy to its citizens, but the celebrations must be limited to what is permitted by the rules of civilized life." The Vesuvius police municipalities and the Carabinieri military police will provide a “massive garrison” to protect the entrances and access.



===============added May 3, 2023=================

             this is the stadium                  The Suspense is Yawning Me

This is what used to be the San Paolo stadium. It was built in
1959 in the Fuorigrotta section of Naples near the gigantic Overseas Fair Grounds, the Mostra d'Oltremare. It is now the Diego Armando Maradona stadium or, quite simply, the Maradona. The name was changed in 2020 in honor of the memory of the Argentine player who lead the Naples team to the "scudetto"  (the championship of the Italian Series A soccer league) twice in the 1980s. This year the team and city are waiting for the third one, thus confirming the old adage (really!) that "There is no two without three." The season still has five or six games to go, but Naples could clinch it mathematically early. That could have happened last Sunday, but didn't. It could happen next week-end. The suspense is middlewhelming.

================added May 5, 2023=================

                    Whoopie. Well, they won, as was expected. In the midst of all the craziness, there were two
                        deaths from misadventure —one from a pistol shot and one from stray fireworks. This is
                                                also, sadly, what one expects in revelry of this nature.

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