Mayor of Bari Responds to De Laurentiis' Comment on Football Team

"Among the duties of those who hold the sports title is not only that of keeping the accounts in order. There is that, perhaps more important, of representing the colors of an entire city, of showing respect to those who every week pay the ticket, support long trips for away games or even simply suffer and rejoice in front of the TV". This is how the long social post of Antonio Decaro, mayor of Bari, who four years ago had opened the doors of the city for the arrival of the De Laurentiis in the city with the purchase of the title of the red and white football team managed in recent years. Today, in the long press conference held in Naples, the same blue patron had defined Bari as "...our second team", a message that evidently did not go down well with the Bari fans. Among these also Mayor Decaro: "For this reason I find the words of Aurelio De Laurentiis, who defines Bari as a second team of Napoli, offensive to the entire community of Bari fans. With all due respect for Napoli, we are not the second team of anyone. We have a history and a dignity that cannot be vilified in this way. As the first citizen and as a fan, I ask Aurelio De Laurentiis to apologize as soon as possible to all the Bari for this very unhappy outing, which hurts our passion and our identity".