Rome – Antisemitic chants at the Olympic Stadium. At the end of the derby between Rome and Lazio in a video posted on Instagram you can hear the Lazio ultras (Curva Nord) singing several times “Go to the synagogue to pray, I’ll always make you run away, Romanist fuck you”.
A few meters below, close to the glass that separates the stands packed with fans and the pitch, there are the Lazio players dancing and celebrating the victory in the derby.
The images are particularly impressive due to the presence of the players who do not seem at all bothered by what their fans are singing. Perhaps they do not notice what the Curva Nord sings as they jump to the rhythm, they certainly do not ask to stop using going to the synagogue as an insult or singing “Jewish Romanist”.
Italian football authorities are investigating alleged anti-semitic chanting from Lazio fans during the weekend’s Rome derby, Serie A announced on Tuesday.
In a statement, Italy’s top flight said that a “follow-up investigation” would be carried out to verify the number of supporters making the offensive chants, videos of which circulated on social media after Lazio’s 1-0 win over Roma on Sunday.
Serie A said the “boorish, outrageous and religiously discriminatory” chants were aimed at Roma fans “several times before the match and once during the game itself”.
On Monday Lazio condemned “expressions of anti-semitism and racism which happen in almost every match at every stadium in Italy”.
“They’re not part of our culture and don’t represent our fans,” the club added in a statement.
Fascist fan groups are common across Italy, including at Roma, but Lazio’s hardcore supporters have a connection to the extreme right which stretches back to at least the 1970s.
Lazio’s historic ultras group, the ‘Irriducibili’, had friendly relations with their equally right-wing counterparts at Inter Milan and Verona.
