The owner of Napoli: “Injuries are giving us a nightmare. What do I want for the 26th? A horn against the jinxes”
Even Christmas greetings become the right opportunity to make some jabs at football institutions for Aurelio De Laurentiis. “If I think about the open bus and the numbers that the live broadcast on Rai produced, these are things that have a profound impact and give a dimension to the importance of this sport, which in my opinion those who manage it from an institutional point of view have not yet understood. Because they are too tied to their seats and thinking about how to be re-elected and not considering the importance of the fact that you must not destroy a game by playing too much. They are giving us nightmares about injuries, because we play too much. The working relationship should be changed, they should be free professionals, who do not subject themselves to binding stress even from a trade union point of view” said the Napoli president to Radio CRC, the club’s partner broadcaster.
decisions
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The outburst continued along the same lines. “We have great lords who rule football and think that at a certain point their re-eligibility depends on formulas that only make us smile. The problem is that everyone wants to add and nobody wants to take away: our players, paid by us, are given to the national team with incredible lightness, when it should be the club that decides. These gentlemen who govern football on a world level are not interested in the protection of the fans for whom the national championship has true value. We need to retrace the atlas of the problems that afflict Italian football and only the owners have the ability to make the appropriate decisions within 24 hours”, reiterated De Laurentiis. In his opinion, there is a very clear conflict of interest: “CEOs and CEOs who need to keep their salaries intact can’t care about taking a risk.”
successes
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Once the outburst was over, the president returned to the happiness of a recently won Italian Super Cup. “We had won two trophies in Benitez’s time in the same year, but they were different. This time the Scudetto and the Super Cup: that’s no small feat. Equaling Maradona? You can’t match him, you’re never as great as him. He had this spirit of a Neapolitan street urchin, of a team boy. He worked with me, we spent a very fun night together with him and Claudia, his wife, in which they told me extraordinary things at a time when I was still starving for calcium.” Yet, the moment in football that left the biggest impression on him is another and much more humble. “The transition from Serie B to Serie A was unforgettable for me. All my life I have tried to entertain people like cinema and I believe that there are few producers in the world who have had as many successes every year as I have had. So when I see that the fans transmit this sense of revenge and this satisfaction to an entire nation, that is a feeling and an enjoyment that no other situation can give you.”
Naples and family
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Finally, a dive into memories. “As a child I was in love with Napoli, because my dad took me to watch the matches. In Naples, Christmas is a continuous celebration that goes from 24 to 6 January, it’s a continuous planning of delicious things that come out of the kitchen. There were more than 100 of us in the family and we played bingo, the merchant at the fair: my grandmother gave us the famous 500 lire in silver and we grandchildren played them at 7 and a half. I told Tommaso Bianchini (general manager of the business area, ed.) to implement a merchant at the fair with the Napoli players, also including some legends. We have a dinner with a great merchant at the fair and we donate the first prize to charity, the other prizes to those who have been more fortunate, in my opinion Bianchini immediately follows this idea.” There’s just enough space for good wishes. “For 2026 we must equip ourselves with health, health and health. And a nice horn against the jinxes”.
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