ROME— Roma’s derby with Lazio will be played on Sunday following an agreement between Serie A and authorities in Rome to move the kick off forward by just half an hour, ending a row which had left teams in the dark about fixtures crucial to UEFA Champions League qualification.
Five matches, including the Rome derby, will kick off at noon following an agreement which cancels an initial order from the Rome Prefect to move the derby to Monday night.
Scheduling for the derby also affected Como, Juventus, AC Milan and Napoli as all five matches involving the teams aiming for a top-four finish have to kick off at the same time, and led to a back-and-forth between football and public security authorities which had dragged on for days.
Serie A said the confirmed new kick-off time came after discussions between Italy’s top football division and Rome’s Prefect and police, AFP reported.
The initial order from the Prefect to move the derby was made to ensure the Rome derby avoided clashing with the Italian Open men’s final, which will played a 5.00pm local time on Sunday, a stone’s throw from the Stadio Olimpico where Roma and Lazio play their home matches.
Thousands of tennis fans will descend on the Foro Italico while police aim to avoid trouble between Roma and Lazio supporters a few hundred metres up the road.
The rivalry between Roma and Lazio is one of Italy’s most keenly felt and crowd violence has been commonplace in and around the Stadio Olimpico on derby days.
Derby row
The impact football matches can have on the Italian Open, one of the ATP’s top-ranked Masters 1000 events, was made clear on Wednesday night when the Italian Cup final was held at the same time as Luciano Darderi’s tennis quarter-final against Rafael Jodar.
Darderi, who eventually won in three sets, didn’t start his match until 21:00 GMT due to a long rain delay in the late afternoon.
His match was interrupted by the smoke from fireworks, shot from the roof of the Olimpico after Inter Milan beat Lazio to win the cup, which drifted to and hung over centre court due to the humidity in the air.
The saga took a farcical turn on Thursday when Rome’s administrative court decided to not rule on Serie A’s appeal against the Prefect’s original ruling, and instead ask the parties to come to their own agreement.
Such a stink has been raised among football supporters, who have suffered through possibly the worst season in the history of the Italian game, that Roma’s hardcore fan groups said they would not attend the match in protest.
It’s a decision which Roma “fully understand”, the club said in a statement while subtly trying to get them to change their mind given the importance of the fixture.
Roma, who is level on 67 points with fourth-placed AC Milan, has not played in the Champions League since being knocked out in the last 16 by Porto in 2019.
