From the stands of the Scarfoglio stadium, just outside Naples, fans on Sunday anxiously awaited the teams’ arrival. The game should have begun 15 minutes earlier, but one of the teams had not even entered the changing room. And it never would.

The Afro-Napoli United players were staying off the pitch in protest at the exclusion of their 27-year-old captain and midfielder, Concetta “Titty” Astarìta, by the club’s managers over her decision to run as a member of a political coalition headed by Matteo Salvini’s far-right League in upcoming local elections.

The team’s president disapproved of Astarìta’s decision because Afro-Napoli – which plays in Serie C, the third tier of Italian football – is composed of migrants and Italians and, according to a statement issued by the club, “was formed with the purpose of inclusion and integration to give a voice to a multi-ethnic Italy which has been the target of discrimination and racism”.

The club’s president, Antonio Gargiulo, said he had no regrets about the decision.

‘‘We cannot tolerate that our captain is one of Salvini’s allies. Salvini is the man who has closed the ports to rescue ships carrying migrants and who detests the integration projects that are the basis of the principles of this team,’’ he told the Guardian. “So we had no doubts about our choice. It’s the girl who has to clarify her decision, not us.”

Astarìta has defended her choice: “I am a person who very much believes in integration in all its forms and the Afro-Napoli project is a great example of racial integration but I would have never thought they could do this. I’ve been playing football since I was 12 years old and made a lot of sacrifices to get here.”

When, two days before the game, Astarìta returned the captain’s armband at evening training and told her teammates of the club’s decision of the club to exclude her, she was embraced by her fellow players.

They said in a statement before Sunday’s game that they stood with Astarìta. “Our decision not to take the field is due to the serious episode of discrimination against our captain, who has been excluded from the team for political reasons. Let us not forget that sport should be non-partisan and apolitical.”

The news soon spread around Italy and the club’s decision was picked up by Salvini, who on Monday tweeted: “The only racists are those of the left. Keep politics out of sport.”

But Astarìta, who has received hundreds of support messages from all over Italy, is keen to point out that she does not share many of Salvini’s ideas, especially those related to immigration. ‘‘I do not agree with his decision to close the Italian ports to boats that help migrants, for example and I do not like the extremist ways in which he implements policies to control migratory flows,” she told the Guardian.

Her exclusion from the team has opened a debate in Italy about the right to express ideas and the one to defend anti-racist principles in a country where government decisions are playing out in the relationships between citizens in everyday life like never before.

The Italian newspaper Corriere della Sera in March reported the news of a Milanese ice-cream maker who was fired by her boss for refusing to serve a gelato to Salvini. In September, crowdfunding saved a bar in Ventimiglia whose owner, Delia Buonomo, had offered a hot meal to passing migrants on their way to France. Her business faced ruin when it was boycotted by citizens who did not like the presence of asylum-seekers.

“Politics in Italy has always influenced everyday life, this is inevitable,” Astarìta said. “But it is not right that it influences sport. When we take to the pitch we are all the same. Ideas, religion or skin colour do not matter.”

Gargiulo, overwhelmed by the criticism, is ready to withdraw Afro-Napoli from Serie C.

“It was painful for us to ask her to choose sides. But for Afro-Napoli, the spirit of the sport is best defined by the raised fist of Tommie Smith and John Carlos at the Olympics in Mexico City in 1968. We cannot accept that one of our players is on Salvini’s side and also on our side.”