“Gasperini? I’ve never seen a team play so well. I hope it doesn’t go away”

Bergamo. “I asked the coach not to leave Bergamo: I’ve been following football for sixty years but I’ve never seen a team play so well”. Word of Mario Nozza, 80 years old (class 1943) Of Bergamosomeone who has seen a lot of ‘Atalante’ during his life but never, he assures, one as beautiful as the one at Gasp.

Yesterday morning (Friday 24 May) Nozza met Gian Piero Gasperini in a bar via Sant’Orsola, sitting at the table with a friend: “I asked him if we could take a photo and he was very kind: I apologized for the inconvenience because he was busy talking to another person. I asked him not to leave, to stay at Atalanta: his Goddess is wonderful.”

The 80-year-old from Bergamo has been a Nerazzurri fan for over sixty years (“For many years I had a season ticket in the stands: every now and then I still go but given my age I can no longer go as much as I used to”). But the memory drawer is full of wonderful memories in Nerazzurri colours, with one in particular that not everyone can boast: “On 2 June 1963 I was at San Siro to see the only Italian Cup final won by the Dea, with the magnificent hat-trick by Domenghini. I was twenty years old and I was at the stadium with my brother-in-law, my sister’s husband. In those days it was different, they played at 30 an hour: I remember Nielsen, Mereghetti, Gardoni, the legendary Pizzaballa. It was a different type of football, the players of that time would struggle a lot today.”

After the disappointment of Rome (“Juve’s goal at the start fooled us, then they built a wall in front of the area”), the final of Dublin Nozza saw it from home, together with his son-in-law (“A Milan fan from Bergamo who celebrated like me”, he laughs ed). A triumph, 90 minutes that removed any label left on what is probably the most brilliant Atalanta that has ever existed: “With Leverkusen I had the feeling that we could do well: the Germans make us play. At Lookman’s third goal I had to take a blood pressure tablet because I was bursting,” she confesses.

“I like all the players of the current team very much: first of all because they are committed, from first to last – underlines the fan -. If I had to say one I would mention Ederson: that boy does so many kilometers it’s impressive. Then Lookman, Scamacca, ‘our’ humble full-back from Bergamo Ruggeri. Every now and then I see them in the city but I don’t want to disturb them: once I saw Teun Koopmeiners at Marianna with his girlfriend”.

Word of a person who has seen a lot of footballers: in his life Nozza worked for forty years in a goldsmith’s shop in Curno, but in his free time he has always followed youth teams in Bergamo as an accompanying manager: “I started fifty years ago in San Tomaso; then Verdello, Alzano Virescit (when he was in series B and C) and finally Albinoleffe, from Beretti to the Esordienti. I still have a membership but I had to stop due to labyrinthitis, I couldn’t drive because I felt dizzy.”

Football which in recent years has also become a family matter, with a classy grandson 2013 who plays in attack for the Debutants of Venice.

What worries him a lot, however, is Gasperini’s future: “I really hope that the coach can stay in Bergamo. If he were to leave, two names that I like are Baroni from Verona and Juric from Torino, who I saw this summer in Pinzolo: he’s someone who hammers like Gasp.”

Nozza closes with a small promise: “If Gasperini stays, I’ll sign up again,” he guarantees, laughing. Who knows, the future still remains to be written. But the past, the recent one, tells of a beautiful and finally winning Atalanta. From San Siro toAviva StadiumMario Nozza can truly say ‘I was there’.