Counting their lucky stars

The scene was a bar on Circonvallazione Clodia, Rome - just half a kilometre down the road from the Olympic Stadium - last Wednesday evening. A woman was shouting almost hysterically whilst beside her another woman was upbraiding the barman: "Oh no, not that, how dare you say a thing like that!"

What obscenity had the barman uttered? Had he commented on one of the women's looks? Had he made some sexually-explicit remark? Was there a dispute about paying the bill? Just when one suspected that the carabinieri would be sent for, the reason for the hullabaloo became apparent when the barman broke into a big laugh and shouted: "All I said was that Roma could lose..."

In the countdown to the final, dramatic act in the Serie A season this Sunday, Roma fans have been getting increasingly edgy. Superstition has weighed in big time with particular words and specific scenarios excommunicated from the collective Roma psyche.

For the uninitiated, it should be pointed out that league leaders AS Roma go into tomorrow's final day of the season two points clear of second-placed Juventus and three points clear of third-placed Lazio, their loathed cross-town rivals. Roma are at home to Parma, Juventus at home to Atalanta and Lazio away to Lecce.

In theory, the business should be reasonably straightforward. Roma only have to beat Parma. That "only", by the way, is precisely the sort of qualifying adverb to which Roma fans take exception.

For Roma, it is the "match of a lifetime", whilst for a Parma side already qualified for the Champions League, the result has no competitive significance. Nor did Parma's already debatable motivation receive much of a morale boost when the side lost Wednesday night's Italian Cup Final to Fiorentina.

All of that notwithstanding, however, certain "things" are not to taken for granted, at least by Roma fans. Finding a way of talking about the "title" (scudetto) without actually mentioning the forbidden word has become a torturous exercise in linguistic dexterity.

Roma fans will alternatively talk to you about the "thing", the "what-you-may-call-it" or the "trucci-trucci-truk". Many of them simply go silent when asked "how will it go on Sunday", whilst at the same time making a whole variety of superstitious gestures with thumbs and little fingers.

There are, of course, reasons both historical and present for these exaggerated misgivings. For a start, unlike their aristocratic rivals up north such as Juventus and AC Milan, Roma are not accustomed to winning titles since they have lifted the scudetto only twice, in 1942 and 1983.

Eighteen years represents a long wait in today's football. In more pragmatic footballing terms, too, Roma fans are inevitably worried by the side's apparent slow-down. Not only have Roma drawn four of their last six games but they also threw away a "match-point" when conceding a late equaliser in a 2-2 draw away to joint second from bottom Napoli last Sunday. Had Roma held on then, the championship was theirs.

Furthermore, three of the outstanding architects of this successful season, namely playmaker Francesco Totti, midfield ball winner Damiano Tommasi and Argentine striker Gabriel Batistuta, have been looking less than 100per cent effective in recent games. Totti admits to "feeling the weight of history" on his shoulders, Tommasi is finally running out of energy as we head into mid-summer heat and Batistuta has inevitably been forced to live off much reduced rations up front.

Against a Parma side with nothing to play for, none of this should matter a dickey. Yet, just to confuse the issue and at the same time add another element of late drama, there is the "Parma-Verona question".

Following Parma's surprise 2-1 defeat at home to relegation battlers Verona last Sunday, Napoli have expressed their suspicions about Parma's attitude, alleging that Verona benefited from a "favour" from Parma because, in fact, the two clubs are at least partly under the same ownership.

If Verona manage to stay up, whilst Napoli go down, then you can take it for granted that Napoli will lodge a formal protest with the Football Federation. In the meantime, Juventus President Vittorio Chiusano added his tuppence worth by calling on Parma to "show a professional attitude" against Roma.

Little wonder that the folks at Parma are getting just a little hot under the collar, as they find themselves at the centre of much unwelcome attention: "We'll play this game as best we can even if it will be difficult not to upset somebody. If we come out being too aggressive, that will annoy some people (i.e. Roma) whilst if we look too disinterested, then others (i.e. Juventus and Lazio) will not be happy. . .

As if Roma fans had not already found enough reasons to scare themselves, there is also the "Montella question". Regularly effective when coming off the bench as a second-half substitute this season, striker Vincenzo Montella has made little secret of his frustration at his role.

When coach Fabio Capello brought him on only seven minutes from the end last Sunday, Montella's patience exploded.

First he first angrily kicked a plastic bottle in the direction of Capello before showing the Roma coach his middle finger in an unmistakable, non-parliamentary gesture which was accompanied with the less than diplomatic words, "piece of shit".

Since then, Capello and Montella have talked "man to man" (Capello's words) and sorted out their differences, at least until next Monday. Since then, too, the Roma players have come together for a "dinner" at Montella's home where, with wives and girlfriends excluded (men have got to do what men have got to do), a "title-winning pact" was sealed, again at least until next Monday.

Roma have, of course, got one hugely important element on their side, namely coach Capello. Not only does he have a winning track record, having won four Italian titles with AC Milan and one Spanish title with Real Madrid, all in the 1990s, but he is also a tough, sergeant-major style coach certain to keep the players' concentration at maximum.

The last time that Roma came this close was in the 1985-'86 season when current England manager, Swede Svem-Goran Eriksson, was in charge. On that occasion, Eriksson toyed with the idea of taking the team to a training camp far from Rome in the build-up to an all-decisive, penultimate game against Lecce.

To his eternal regret, Eriksson allowed himself to be convinced that the team would be fine staying at home in Rome. Roma, inexplicably, lost 3-2 to a Lecce side already relegated and thus blew their title chances. Eriksson has ever since been convinced that hype and outside pressures cost his Roma side that title.

Capello has not made that same mistake. This week, the Roma players have been "off limts" to the media. Capello himself had been doing the talking: "The truth is that, if at the beginning of the season you had said we would go into the last day in a home game with a two-point advantage, we would have been delighted.

"Our table position is the only reality that matters, the rest is just idle chatter. I don't see any psychological problems. We will play really well on Sunday".

No psychological problems perhaps but note that even Capello is careful not to mention the forbidden word, scudetto.