“Paolo Nori, writer and above all Crusader fan, says that the only things that make him cry are Dostoevsky and Parma matches. I can certainly confirm the second, not having his culture and not knowing the Russian writer.

The thing that amazes me is that this feeling continues, even in a season like this where at a certain point it seemed we were going to be promoted to Serie A two months early. I’ve been wondering about this since yesterday, not being able to understand until now. I don’t understand the reason, even if I found some answers.

I cry in front of another victory for Parma because I think that supporting your hometown team is a fortune and a privilege, I cry for those unique shirts in the world, white with black cross, which represent 110 years of history, which in my small way I have tried to reconstruct, telling the stories of more normal champions and footballers, who have generated the identity of this team: in recent months I have met and appreciated footballers who wore our colors 50 years ago, the children of those who are not more physically with us, and everyone has something in their eyes when they talk about Parma that they can’t explain.

Then I connect everything back to my grandfather, who gave me this damned passion, thinking about how happy he would have been today, at the café, talking about this team and that we would have hugged each other today celebrating this triumph.

Yesterday before the match, I spent a couple of hours with Giovanni Ferraguti, historic photojournalist of the Gazzetta, leafing through his archive of photos from the 70s onwards, and while he told me the anecdotes of names that many perhaps don’t even know, from Rizzati to Volpi , from Bonci, Colonnelli and Toscani, I thought that shortly thereafter we would write another page in the history of this city and this team.

Neither I, nor Giovanni, nor Paolo Nori, nor any of the Parma fans who waited for this victory and this goal were wrong.

Personally, I can’t wait to be moved by the next victory.”

Pietro Chittolini, Parma fan, 2nd May 2024