We have unfortunately become accustomed, for a year and a half, to long silent evenings, confinement to curfews, like the leaden silence that suddenly fell on Rome, Sunday July 11, shortly after the coup d sending of the final of the Euro football. While in Wembley Stadium the Azzuri took a blow to the head from the 2e minute by a strike from Luke Shaw giving the advantage to the English selection, the entire Italian capital was plunged into a deep lethargy, barely disturbed by a few shudders, at the mercy of the rare occasions of the Nazionale.
The atmosphere changed dramatically earlier, with the equalizer of veteran Leonardo Bonucci (34), after a corner followed by a particularly confused action. In the stands of Wembley, the Italian president, Sergio Mattarella, who never loses, usually, his phlegm of horse guard British, cannot restrain at that moment a spontaneous, perfectly childish movement of joy. The scene did not fail to be immediately relayed by the press and on social networks, with an amusement not devoid of tenderness.
The fight has changed, therefore, and, in the squares of the capital, the atmosphere has changed, resignation giving way to anxious hope, while the tension has become a little more palpable every moment, to the approach of the penalty shoot-out. In this regard, Italy has some happy memories (including a certain World Cup final against France in 2006), but also a good number of disappointments.
Health recommendations quickly forgotten
So the failure of the second Italian shooter, Belotti, has the effect of a cold shower. A series of English boondoggles, and two consecutive stops by the immense Gianluigi Donnarumma, elected best player of the competition, will have the effect of turning the situation once again, and freeing a whole people.
From the end of the penalty shootout, crowds arose in the streets of the capital and all major Italian cities, mingled with concerts of horns and firecrackers that will last a good part of the night. In Rome, the banks of the Tiber are invaded, in a few minutes, by an endless procession of walkers and cars, all filled to the brim and decorated with Italian flags.
Nearby, it is the entire historic center which becomes a gigantic “fan-zone”, within which the health recommendations of the authorities are quickly forgotten. We gather on the Campo dei Fiori, which had not seen such crowds for a year and a half, we storm the fountains of Piazza Navona … The police are trying to prevent certain access to the places most taken by storm, but what is the point of preventing crowds when the crowd is everywhere?
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