“Our stadium? Beautiful”: these are the words of the new president of Messina, Justin Davis, on the potential of Franco Scoglio. “A resource, in addition to being home. The priority is to ensure that it does not remain empty and is once again populated by fans – he explained in the project presentation conference -. We have some ideas, to create a VIP area before the matches, but also to open it to the city during the week, with events, not just twice a month. There are accommodations in the guesthouse where you can also invite guests. Of course, greater care, attention and maintenance are needed. Color and love. Even inside. We need to increase the relationship with fans and the city”.
The first occasion will be the “125 Legends” on December 1st, which already counts on the participation of important old glories: Dida, Storari, Storari, Frey, Cannavaro, Iaquinta, Montolivo, Evani, Mauri, Perrotta, Evani, Eranio, Zambrotta, Pancaro, Serginho, Jeda, Di Napoli, Cerci, Budel, Parisi, Marcolin, Coppola, Giannichedda, Tacchinardi, Jankulovski, Iuliano, Jeda and Donadoni. But other world champions are expected. Furthermore, special guests, influencers and content creators, such as the already announced ZW Jackson, who will also be attractive to younger audiences. For the occasion, an expansion of the capacity will be requested from the current 5000 seats granted through municipal concession.
After the first fact-finding meeting last Saturday, on Thursday the club’s leaders met again with the mayor Federico Basile together with the general director of the Municipality, Salvo Puccio. There was talk of future collaborations, to be defined on two levels: the first concerns the use of the San Filippo, which in a first phase should take place according to the usual municipal tariffs (at the moment they are the same as the previous year but with fewer “services”). The other plan is that of a more structured path, perhaps multi-year, also to carry out improvements internally and externally. Obviously, all reasoning to be explored further and possibly determined.
At Palazzo Zanca we talked about prospects and development also from a “Celeste” perspective, settled and soon available to the community again. The idea of returning to play official matches, at least in Serie D, resists, but some safety requirements should be overcome. So it is more likely that we will stay at San Filippo and perhaps use the renovated stadium in via Oreto more during the week.
In the long term, Racing has also expressed the idea of creating or setting up a sports center to allocate the spaces to the establishment of a future academy.