“A race that seemed like a month long”. Yet it was not a war, that Samp-Piacenza, on the contrary. But an already uncompromising referee of his decided to rain cards like never before …
Eight here, nine there. The game ended like this, with the players counted and the referee who had left for the bribe, and would have waved the red card to anyone, perhaps even to a couple of stewards passing by, to the incredulous Marassi spectators, to the toll-keeper on the way back home. Twenty-two had left, seventeen remained. Eight here, nine there. Record of expelled – five – in Serie A. And who had ever seen a match like this? Chased Balleri, Franceschetti, Dieng, Rossi and Piovani, the first three from Sampdoria, the other two from Piacenza. That Sunday – October 19, 1997 – he had won Sampdoria, 3-1, but the result was the least important thing of a day that would remain in the history of our football. Because that is remembered as the day of ordinary madness for referee Roberto Bettin, from the Padua section, red card office.
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