I am celebrating 40 years of closely following Calcio this season, where back in the day, come round 6 of the 1983/84 season I had found a regular source of getting my hands on Guerin Sportivo magazine (the Italian bible on football). It used to be a weekly magazine back then, now monthly, and despite being a week out of date before it hit the newsagent in Edinburgh, there was no internet or easy access to information like we have today, let alone streaming of games across the globe, so those pages of text and images were solid gold to me.
One rogue copy from the previous season had fallen into my possession, the penultimate round of Serie A when Roma had just clinched the title with a 1-1 draw at Genoa. It was the catalyst to a lifetime of devotion to this publication that continues to this day, now arriving at my door courtesy of my great friend Stefano in Ancona. Of course, in my world it wasn’t the names at the top of the league that drew my attention but the bottom two. Cesena were already known to me, forming part of my subbuteo playing days, but in the real world they were second bottom heading down. I would see them 4 years later in my first ever game in Italy en route back to Serie A.
The club who were rock bottom, badly adrift at the foot were Catanzaro. It was a name that stayed with me and throughout the intervening years, I have always kept an eye on their progress, or in truth, largely the lack of it. Indeed 1982 to 1984 were horrible seasons for the boys from Calabria. It was the very sad end of what has been coined as the club’s golden era. Following twelve consecutive seasons in Serie B from 1958/59, and a Coppa Italia final in 1966, the club enjoyed two solitary Serie A campaigns in 1971/72, then 1975/76, followed by a five year spell in the top flight from 1978/79, which was just coming to an end in 1982/83 as I started to keep a close eye on the Italian game. The downward spiral from such a traumatic relegation can sometimes be hard to arrest, and the very next season Catanzaro were propping up Serie B and headed for the third tier, where save one brief season in 2005/06, when they were last again, it has been Serie C or level below ever since.
In that inaugural season in Serie A, when only three matches were won, (along with 15 draws), the stand out win was the very first, albeit more than halfway through the season in game 16, when the mighty Juventus came unstuck 1-0 at their tidy Stadio Communale as it was known (now the Nicola Ceravolo stadium) with Angelo Mammi grabbing the goal. The wait had almost been worthwhile, what a first ever Serie A scalp to have on your CV. The commendable five year top flight stay was aided by club legend Massimo Palanca and a young Claudio Ranieri. Both joined Catanzaro in 1974, and perhaps Massimo moving to Napoli in 1981 was the catalyst to the club starting to falter. Palanca had scored 70 goals in 7 years from 206 appearances. Claudio left the year after having played 226 times scoring 8 as a defender. Palanca would cement his legendary status by returning in 1986 for a further four season stint, where 45 goals were scored in a further 126 matches. It is worth highlighting how much at home he felt at the Communale, as his five year journey away at Napoli (twice, just 2 goals), Como (2 goals) and Foligno (18) in 98 games between all three clubs, compared to 115 goal in 332 games for Catanzaro. It adds credence to the notion that some strikers just feel at home at a certain club. Just ahead of the new season Palanca was invited back to the club, where at a ceremony in the city celebrating his 70th birthday, an emotional hero of yesteryear was given honorary citizenship of Catanzaro, with the club retiring the number 11 jersey from the roster in his honour.
Twelve seasons in the fourth tier were not where Catanzaro wanted to be, (12 is a number Catanzaro obviously enjoy), then known as C2 and throw in two bankruptcy issues in 2006 and 2011, the late 20th century/early noughties were largely tales of woe. Immediately after the second of these issues, via the playoffs, Catanzaro were back in the third tier, where they have stayed ever since until last season’s very special, runaway Serie C, Girone C title (one season shy of the 12 this time around!).
The proceeding five or six years are where I got more closely involved with the club, watching them play regularly courtesy of my now sadly defunct streaming channel. The extensive play-offs would regularly be achieved, even from a later start in the lengthy competition by finishing third, then second, but invariably they would come unstuck. Feralpisalo were a constant thorn, and now they can joust with them in Serie B.
The only answer to this constant hard luck tale in the playoffs was to go one step further and win the league, which they did in spectacular fashion last season, scoring 102 goals and coming just a point shy of 100 with 96, losing just two and drawing 6, where most of these dropped points arrived after promotion had been clinched.
Finally getting back to Serie B after 18 years is where Catanzaro truly belongs, and confidence will be running high that they can avoid all the pitfalls of that tragic 2005/06 campaign. More solid B days are as far off as four decades ago, with more than a generation of Catanzaro tifosi (fans) having no memory of that golden era. With that in mind you can understand the caution as the new season gets underway, where the modest aim is to achieve a good solid first season back in the second tier without undue struggles. However, the excitable nature of an Italian, especially a southern one is hard to hide, and on the day of the game I was here to watch, it was palpable, with red and yellow colours draped from so many vantage points, and the pre match chat started early.
Calabria’s biggest four clubs have now all enjoyed a recent renaissance, with Catanzaro the last of the quartet to enjoy the spoils of a loftier league. Near rivals Crotone made Serie A for a couple of seasons a few years back, but did that double relegation thing ahead of last term, where they tried to hold onto Catanzaro’s coat tail, but eventually their spirit was broken too, and invariably they faltered in the playoffs. Cosenza will be awaiting Catanzaro for what is known as Derby Della Calabria, highlighting the notion that these two are the principal sides of the region, even if just historically.
The last of the big Calabrian quartet are Reggina, from the very southern city of Reggio Calabria. When I saw them at Parma last season they were top of Serie B bringing a huge support to the Tardini. While they slipped down from automatic promotion, they made the playoffs to get back to Serie A but without success. That was the least of the club’s issues, as missed deadlines to pay guarantee monies, followed by all sorts of fruitless appeals, resulted in them starting two leagues down in Serie D this season.
When the fixtures were announced I was totally focused on getting to a Catanzaro game back in Serie B. I chose a midweek trek via Catania in Sicily to see Aquile Del Sul (Eagles of the South) play only their second home game back in B against the relegated Aquiloti (the little eagles) of La Spezia or so I thought. But nothing in Italy regarding calcio in the lower leagues has been straightforward this summer as you will discover.
Having kept an eye on Catanzaro for decades, during the pandemic and onwards especially, I started to embrace my enthusiasm for the club by getting them involved in my burgeoning Italian shirt collection. Their shirt manufacturer Eye Sports makes it easy to buy online and send to the UK (a major issue for many smaller clubs in Italy) and Catanzaro Calcio have gone from zero to quite a few shirts in a very short period of time. I have long wished to go see a game there, the sort of thing a pandemic helped focus the mind on, a football bucket list, and having just ticked up a 100th match in Italy in January, I couldn’t think of a more appropriate location to start the next chapter.
Catanzaro is the capital of Calabria, but with a population of just over 86,000 it isn’t the region’s biggest city, with that honour falling to the aforementioned Reggio Calabria, right down in the toe of the country, near where my train disembarked from the ferry from Sicily en route to Catanzaro. By train it isn’t the easiest place to reach, as Catanzaro is close to the sole of the boot if you will, nearer the toe than the heel but off the coast. The train north from Reggio needs to be alighted at Lamezia Terme, then take a connection headed east. Catanzaro Lido is the beach resort town on the mainline towards Puglia where you need to get off, but the journey isn’t finished, as a bus will then whisk you off the coast into the hills a bit to the city of Catanzaro. It takes around 40 minutes. There are some important caveats to this journey, so if you are thinking of going, pay attention, serious attention to ‘Getting there’ section.
What a truly spectacular gem Catanzaro is to visit. My goodness it could give San Marino a run for its money in terms of slopes, hill and height up, but as I discovered, Catanzaro isn’t somewhere that hits the news very often even in Italy, and maybe it needs to stop selling itself short. I thoroughly recommend this city, largely tourist free, but with a lot of interesting buildings, stunning views, and an up and down endless hill walks, it will guarantee aiding a fitness regime. In all seriousness, if you struggle to walk, Catanzaro isn’t for you, a piece of flat land is rare.
The city itself dates back to the 9th century when it was founded by the Byzantines, where for two centuries it was at the heart of Europe’s silk trade, with much of its produce finding its way to the Vatican. (This will be concluded in Catanzaro once I have seen the modern city for myself).
Catanzaro’s stadium, since 1990 known as the Nicola Ceravolo in honour of one of the clubs great Presidents, has a capacity of 14,650. This is a figure that might be reached a few times this season should they hit the ground running in Serie B, and even before they do, the match I watched ended up selling out for the home end with 12,196 in attendance. At 700 metres above sea level, it is possibly the highest stadium in the country. Generally, in Italy, churches are up a hill, having to climb to worship, but in Catanzaro, this extremely tidy and well presented stadium holds that status.
Despite clinching promotion as early as March, rather farcically, five days before the clubs big B homecoming versus Ternana (a game just 3 days before my arrival), the Ceravolo didn’t have the necessary certification to host second tier football! Having booked my trip, and having survived a potential delay to the season, I found myself fretting about this game being moved to Lecce, which would be yet more re-arranging, let alone lunacy!
Thankfully the need to uproot my plans were averted, but hilariously, while denied a licence for the stadium one day, they were accepted the very next one?! However, that one day delay meant the Sunday match versus Ternana had to be played 450km away at 20.30 in Lecce. Just to compound the angst of the local fans, the Salento (Lecce) police had said they wouldn’t grant this match the opportunity for an audience! Bureaucracy and madness had taken over, after all, football surely is an entertainment, a spectator sport, but at times Italy seems to forget that. A compromise was finally reached, with 1,500 Catanzaro and 300 Ternana allowed to attend, but it never got near those figures, with just a couple of hundred brave souls from Catanzaro and only 10 from Terni bothering to travel! It was just dreadful. Tickets for that match only went on sale the morning of the day prior to the match, and not online, only via known outlets in the city! The Ultras certainly gave it a swerve. I am pleased to report that Catanzaro won 2-1, a first win in B for 18 years, just a shame so few witnessed it.
The upshot of all of the above was that while I was thankfully going to be in the right city to see the game, it was now the first Serie B game in Catanzaro for that lengthy 18 year period, not the second as originally scheduled, hence the sell out. They were thankfully available online, albeit going on sale just 52 hours ahead of the match on the Monday afternoon, without any real announcement as to when. Now I know the club had a major headache in the week prior, but communication and signposting, that’s what it is all about. I kept checking every hour on the hour on the Monday to see if the match would appear on the ticket platform. At 4pm they went live, and while I was a little late, the system kept crashing, doubtlessly with volume of purchasers. I finally joined a queue of 544, which took more than half an hour to filter down to me, but minutes later I had my golden ticket. The relief was palpable. It is fair to say that it had been one of the most arduous journeys to a match in my life, if not the worst. Booking flights, accommodation, trains etc only then to discover an uncertainty in knowing if any game in Serie B was going to be on, then where it would be, and finally could I get a ticket. All that unneccesary faffing made sure I was going to enjoy this momentous occasion even more, and having enjoyed the surprising delights of Catanzaro all afternoon ahead of the game, the mood was bouyant, and it wasn’t just me, the whole city was buzzing for it.
I went for one of my field reconnaisance hikes, quite literally an uphill jaunt from my recommended Hotel Guglielmo, named after the coffee of the region (who used to shirt sponsor the club), and it seems, diversified from merely coffee production and a shop into ownership of lovely hotel. It is one of only a handful in the city, and with its location just half a kilometre below the Ceravolo, it was the perfect location, particularly for a night game. The club had told me an FIGC rule meant no access on match day prior to gates opening, but invariably, someone leaves a door open! Just a few daylight snaps are doing no one any harm, as well as being better for showcasing the character of the stadium before the crowds arrive and the light fades.
From the minute I stepped off the bus in the late morning in Catanzaro, it just had the feel that something good was going to happen, and my goodness was this a night that will live long in the pantheon of memories of this famous old ground, and mine. Being high above sea level, the wind had been warm but brisk all day. Given the stadium is hewn out of the hill near top of the town, I made a bit of a fashion faux pas, as it soon became apparent that a Catanzaro shirt and shorts weren’t going to keep me warm. I wasn’t the only one caught out, but generally, the locals seemed more familiar with the wind that certainly would give Gayfield, Arbroath a run for its money on this particular occasion. What we needed was a rip- roaring contest to aid the art of forgetting about the chill wind. The second half certainly wasn’t going to let me down.
When you consider that Catanzaro and Spezia were two leagues apart last term, you can forgive Catanzaro for yielding slightly in the first half, but they worked hard at closing down, and looking to counter at pace, albeit they couldn’t muster much. Neither team really carved out any clear cut opportunity, save a penalty award for Spezia that looked mighty soft, and only awarded after the chap got his shot away. The resultant spot kick was brilliantly saved by Fulignati, the Catanzaro keeper, but the volume of furious delight that rung out around the Ceravolo was quite extraordinary. Eighteen years of pent up emotion was released in one roar.
It is easy to have unity in a team, and its bond with the fans when things are going well. Winning helps create that mentality, and Catanzaro have been used to winning for more than a year now. That wasn’t about to change here, not on this momentous occasion. But one aspect of the first half that hadn’t been an undue factor was the wind. Spezia hadn’t used it, not even having one speculative biff from distance. Perhaps Catanzaro are more used to a wind whipping from one end to the other, but no matter, they certainly used it brilliantly. Searching long balls got the Spezia defence turned and chasing, cut inside, slide precision pass, then whack it. This is more or less the strategy that brought not one, not two, but three searing drives that put the game to bed, and the party just kept on coming.
The full-time whistle brought unrestrained joy, The Eagles were flying. Just about the entire crowd stayed for an extra ten, fifteen minutes while the players rightly took the applause. Having played two of the relegated Serie A clubs in the opening three games might have been considered tricky, but a 0,0 at Cremonese, together with this win, and the one at Lecce versus Ternana saw Catanzaro joint second in the table. It is early days, and bumps in the road will be expected, but a winning habit can take you far. I really hope they bed down well in Serie B. They certainly have a fabulous support base in a calcio crazy city. I look forward to following their journey this season and beyond.
GETTING THERE
As alluded to earlier, Catanzaro Città (city) has no proper rail link to the outside world, largely due to the severity of slopes. Catanzaro Lido by the sea is where you need to get off a train that might have approached from Taranto in Puglia, or Lamezia Terme (it also has an airport) on the Roma to Reggio Calabria line. Lamezia Terme truly is the regional equivalent of York or Crewe, but doing its chaotic business off just a handful of platforms. With no amenties worth writing about, a small knot of bars/restaurants are right across the road outside the station. It even has a fine hotel should you miss a connection or need a bed for an early start the next day.
If you are headed from Lamezia, a station before the Lido is called Catanzaro! Don’t get off here. It is truly in the middle of nowhere, an industrial estate stop more or less, but why it carries this name is confusing.
Getting off a Catanzaro Lido, the bus stop is outside the station by the station cafe. You can buy tickets inside, or Trenitalia will sell you one online, the problem is, it can be an erratic service, not tied into train arrivals, and doesn’t even seem to stick to the timetable. Some kind driver from another company let me on for the 7 kilometre upward journey. Buying from the cafe gives you options.
FOOD AND DRINK
Catanzaro isn’t a tourist town, and restaurants seem in short supply in the centre (hotels too) from what I could see. Plenty cafe/bars, that sell snacky foods and ice cream parlours are well represented, but pizzeria etc are lacking. You are more likely to find carryout pizza slice retailing.
If you chose to stay down at sea level at Catanzaro Lido, the beach resort 7/10 kilometres away, you will find plenty of options, but bear in mind the journey back. It might need a taxi after a night game and that will set you back around €40.
Around the stadium, you will find no shortage of bars for a drink, but oddly not one entrepreneurial catering van could be seen selling piadina sandwiches etc, the classic staple of outside Stadio grub.
The club shop is in the city centre on Corso Mazzini, the same name as Cosenza. Piazza Cavour doesn’t seem to exist in the South! A variety of shirts, jackets and T shirts available, but no pennant, scarf or badge? Do these items not sell in Italy? The scarf I can understand as everywhere has a scarf seller outside the stadium.
Football Adventures with James Rendall 