Naples Football News – The president of Naples Aurelio De Laurentiismade some statements on the sidelines of the meeting with the Pope in the Vatican:
“I am pleased that so many kids are wearing the Napoli shirt playing on the pitches and in the squares. Football has a very high social value and Napoli is a somewhat complex social reality because it has been subjected to French and Spanish domination for centuries and is used to Instead, the Napoli shirt connects the sky and the sea in a concept of absolute freedom and social redemption and that’s why kids from all over the world want to wear it.
We did a research which established that there are around 83 million football fans who love Napoli and we hope that with the Scudetto victory they will reach 150 million. If we then had to add the Chinese and Koreans because we have Kim and the Australians where there is a large community of Italians I don’t know how far we would arrive.
I’m not just talking about Italians who have lived elsewhere perhaps for generations, I’m also talking about people who have nothing to do with Italy. Naples represents a libertarian symbol of honesty and propensity towards others, because in Naples they always say: ‘there is room for you'”.
It’s the second time we’ve met the Pope, and I gave him Maradona’s foot as a symbol to wear around his neck to drive away all the inopportunities that the world has in store for us because with the ball you can get anywhere.
On the other hand, I brought him two shirts with his name on it and it would be nice if he displayed it during the angelus. I know it couldn’t be done, but Pope Francis is also very popular for a few steps forward. If he did so, he could raise a few million euros to be allocated to the disasters of Emilia Romagna or the war in Ukraine.
Or he could just sign it and then we’ll take care of auctioning it.
Pope Francis is a great example because he possesses a secular energy which, however, brings him ever closer to God. I would really like him to be able to kick off a friendly match between Naples and San Lorenzo al Maradona”.
