Roma fans turn on Pallotta

By Football Italia staff

Roma ultras aimed a series of insulting banners and letters at President James Pallotta, insisting “we don’t want the new” Stadio Della Roma.

The patron finally got the all-clear to build the new arena and work is expected to begin this year, but not everyone is happy about it.

Pallotta spoke at the Leaders in Sport conference in London this week and some of his comments infuriated the fans.

“We’re spending a lot of time deciding on what security measures there will be, what kind of facial recognition we’ll use,” said Pallotta.

“Have any of you seen a match in Italy? Do you know what the derby between Roma and Lazio is like?

“In the north of Italy they don’t fight much, it’s not like that, but in the south like in Naples and Rome the security problems are very significant.

“A year-and-a-half ago we went to the police, sat around a table and asked: ‘why don’t you arrest these people?’ I opened up a file of people who had committed some acts but there were only blurred images.

“So they asked us to install HD cameras inside and we bought them, despite the fact we don’t own the stadium, to see who was creating the problems.”

Over the last 24 hours, a series of banners have appeared outside the Trigoria training ground and even at the site of the proposed new arena in Tor di Valle.

Messages including ‘Pallotta spy, go away’ and ‘Pallotta U$er’ were placed in full view, while a group of the Roma ultras sent an open letter to the President.

“The history of Roma has always been its fans, not its success on the field, and you are trying to actively destroy it by changing the club symbol, collaborating with the authorities on barriers in the Stadio Olimpico, staying silent on fines, going against your own people.

“So what do we say to you? We don’t want the new stadium!!! We don’t want a President like this! If you have to use and insult us… In any case, we will always represent Roma and its fans, so many of you pass by and the Curva Sud remains.”

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