LR Vicenza (Stadio Romeo Menti)

 While I was over in Veneto, I was also lucky enough to visit Vicenza. It's a great little town and as well as the great cafes and bars and of course all the renaissance architecture, it is a place that has a real football legacy. And what's more, they had just celebrated going up from Serie C1 to Serie B.

LR Vicenza are one of Italy’s most historic provincial clubs, traditionally known for their strong identity, youth development, and periods of impressive overachievement relative to their size. Although most recently in C1, Vicenza have spent much of their history moving between Serie A and Serie B, with their peak coming in the 1970s and 1990s when they were regularly competitive in the top flight. The club carries a reputation for being well-organised and resilient, often punching above their weight against bigger northern sides.

One of the things that interested me the most about visiting there was the legacy of Paolo Rossi- the hero of the 1982 World Cup, who is synonymous with the Azzurri of that time, and when I think of him in a club shirt, Juventus always comes to mind. However, he spent four years at Vicenza between 1976 and 1980 and looking around the stadium and surrounding area, his legacy is everywhere.  He appears on murals, iconography on the stadium, in a gold statue and even has a bar named after him despite all being 50 years ago.  It seems fair to say that the legacy of Paolo Rossi at Vicenza is central to the club’s identity. Rossi became a national figure during his time there, most notably firing the team to promotion to Serie A and finishing as one of the league’s top scorers in 1977–78. That season, Vicenza famously finished as Serie A runners-up, with Rossi’s goals and movement defining one of the most remarkable overperformances in Italian football history. His breakthrough in Vicenza laid the foundations for his later World Cup glory with Italy in 1982, but in the city itself he remains a defining symbol of the club’s golden era.

The Paolo Rossi legacy definitely adds character to the Stadio Romeo Menti, but it also has a lot of charachter. It's a compact and traditional looking stadium and fortunately not a far walk from the city centre, near the university. The capacity is officially 12,000, but they sometimes record higher crowds! Unusually for a lot of Italian grounds it looks like the  supporters are right on top of the pitch. I can imagine that there is a really great atmosphere and it would be great to make it over there one day for a match.




 


















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