Pisa is like this: gruff, grumpy, always ready to find faults and flaws. But then you find it there, united and compact in pursuit of a dream. When the Sporting Club is playing an important milestone, an entire province is lined up alongside the players in the Nerazzurri jersey. A people that identifies itself in those vertical stripes and in the symbol that represents a team and an entire territory. It has been possible in their length from the long lines that of meters that have marked the pace of time in the first part of this week true passion: sporty, intimate, collective. Between the alleys of the center, up to the streets of the Pisan hinterland, it was all a chatter and confrontation on the two games that will determine the outcome of an exciting, engaging season, with a breathtaking ending.

When tickets went on sale for the first leg match, which will be played tonight at the U Power Stadium in Monza, there were even those who are positioned with the sleeping bag near the Vivaticket circuit retailers just to be sure. to purchase one of the 677 tickets made available for the guest sector. And then on Wednesday 25 May the pre-emption for the coupons of the return match also started, Sunday 29 May, at the Garibaldi Arena: other endless queues in the retailers of the city and at the Tifo Pisa in Fornacette. Thousands of Nerazzurri hearts united by the dream: reviewing Pisa in Serie A 31 years later.

Large screen in Piazza dei Cavalieri: access allowed to 2,600 people

Because Pisa is one intergenerational question: it is a faith that is really handed down from father and mother to son, from grandparents to grandchildren, it is a family affair which, when it comes to the games that matter, catalyses them inside the walls of the house. When the Nerazzurri play there are fathers who, overcome by the pangs of anxiety, abandon the TV and rush into the street waiting to hear the liberating roar of the people attached to the screen. There are men and women who repeat with scrupulous attention the superstitious rituals to be exhausted just before the kick-off of the match. There are fans who do not abandon their lucky place during the match, they wear the same shirt worn, perhaps, in the 2007 final. When, ironically, Monza was on the road to the dream of returning to Serie B.

Pisa, the Sporting Club, the Nerazzurri and the hearts of an entire province are inextricably linked. An intertwining of passion, joys, disappointments, victories and slips that has never been scratched by the twists and turns of fate. And also in this new undertaking to be accomplished and in the annals there is a people lined up alongside the players, the coach and the club. Anxiety, superstition, fears, dreams and desires: it all takes place in four days.