CalcioMercato: 40 Serie A Matches This Season Have Had No Away Fans in Attendance

Away trips, a collective tradition that has brought together fans of different ages and from different regions for decades, are now increasingly becoming restricted, turning into a measure targeted by prefects, local authorities and law enforcement agencies in the name of public order. The current common practice is to issue bans in advance to avoid having to deal with possible (though uncertain) clashes between supporters later. As a result, this season 40 matches across Serie A, Serie B, Serie C and the Coppa Italia have taken place without local away supporters in attendance, while around 50 additional matches have been affected by ticket eligibility restrictions.

Sport Report wrote in its newspaper that, considering the season started less than a month ago, the figure is indeed high, as the earliest bans date back to around mid-August during the Coppa Italia and Coppa Italia Serie C qualifying rounds.

Current practices and related regulations

La Gazzetta dello Sport pointed out that, for these sporting events, the Security Observatory has handed the assessment work to the Security Analysis Committee in order to introduce “appropriate strict measures.” By convention, this is almost always a preliminary step toward a suspension of supporters. The relevant restrictions became stricter after last season: within two weeks, there were first encounters between Roma and Fiorentina supporters on the A1 motorway, followed by incidents involving Lazio and Napoli supporters. This approach applies broad restrictions, affecting not only the most active supporters in the stands but also families and ordinary fans who have no connection with extremist supporter groups.

Since authorities cannot directly ban supporters of “Team X” from entering, they use place of residence as the reference criterion, although this information should normally be verified through identification checks at entry. This approach can also lead to some unusual consequences. For example, before the Lazio match against Bologna (which was ultimately opened to the public), Lazio supporters had already anticipated that they might be unable to travel to Bologna for the opening league match. They therefore began spreading a social media campaign, planning to “take a cultural trip to visit the city’s churches.” After all, under the current rules, while supporters can be prevented from entering a stadium, people cannot be stopped from freely traveling between different cities.