May 4, 1997: Roma Lazio 1-1
- Lazio Stories
- May 4
- 9 min read
The Protti express arrives just in time
A 92nd minute equaliser gives ten-man Lazio late point
Also on this day:
The season so far
The previous season Lazio had arrived third with an excellent final rush. A lot of players had left the club during the summer transfer window: Aron Winter (Inter), Alen Boksic (Juventus), Marco Di Vaio (loan to Bari), Roberto Di Matteo (Chelsea) and Cristiano Bergodi (Padova). Coming in were defender Mark Fish (Orlando Pirates) who had played really well in the African Nations Cup, midfielder and rising star Roberto Baronio (Brescia), Paul Okon (Club Bruges), Pavel Nedved (Sparta Prague) and forwards Renato Buso (Napoli) and last year’s top scorer, together with Beppe Signori, Igor Protti (Bari). Manager Zdeněk Zeman had been confirmed.
The first game of the season was the first round of the Coppa Italia. The Biancocelesti won at Avellino. In the UEFA Cup, Lazio were paired with Lens in the first round. There was history with the French club. In 1977 Lazio had won the first leg 2-0 at the Olimpico but in the return match after 90 minutes Lens were 2-0 up. In extra time the Biancocelesti collapsed and Lens scored 4 more goals. This time round Lazio managed to win away with a goal from José Chamot and then drew 1-1 at home. In the round of 32 the Biancocelesti had to face Tenerife and had won 1-0 at home but then collapsed 5-3 in the Canary Islands.
In campionato, Lazio did not have a good start. After eight games they were 14th, just a couple of points above the relegation zone. But the situation improved and five games later they were only 2 points away from third place. In January Lazio beat Milan 3-0 and everybody thought that they had recovered. But two home defeats in the next two games meant a further debacle. President Sergio Cragnotti sacked Zeman and called Dino Zoff to save the season. Zoff was President of the club at the time, but he left the presidency and put his tracksuit back on.
Zeman was heartbroken. The straw that broke the camel’s back was Tenerife. Lazio had scored the opening goal, then fell behind twice but managed to come back only to melt away and lose 5-3. The Czech was the main culprit. Signori stated at the end of the game “Scoring three away goals, no team in the world would have been kicked out”. Diego Fuser was even more drastic: “This time it’s not the player’s fault, the blame must be sought elsewhere. As for the tactical attitude, ask the coach. It is useless to bring players who do not follow him in training. Those who do not listen must stay at home”. The Zeman bubble had burst.
After being fired Zeman said: “Without Lazio I’m a destroyed man, I have never done so badly. I’m disappointed but not with myself. I’ve always given everything I had to Lazio. I must have made a few mistakes: the main one was that I wasn’t convincing enough”.
Under Zoff the situation improved. Lazio were in 5th position, on 43 points. The Biancocelesti had a two-point lead on Udinese who were 7th (top 6 qualified for Europe). In the last three games, Lazio had beaten Piacenza 2-0 at home, lost 0-1 away to Sampdoria and then thrashed Reggiana 6-1 at home. Lazio were on decent form and climbing the table with 5 wins in the last 7 games.
Roma were having a poor year, first under Carlos Bianchi and then, from April 20 Nils Liedholm. The Giallorossi were 12th, on 36 points. They had lost the last three games, Cagliari 1-2 away, Parma 0-1 at home and Fiorentina 1-2 away and were winless since March 16. All the more dangerous for Lazio in today's derby.
Lazio on better form and seven points ahead. What could go wrong? Everything, this was the local derby in which the underdogs often triumphed. It was basically Roma's last chance to salvage a so far forgettable season.
The match
A packed 75,000 stadium welcomed the two local rivals onto the Olimpico turf. It was a warm May day and the game was being played relatively late in the season to be a derby.
Lazio had Pierluigi Casiraghi back from injury and Alessandro Nesta too, back on the bench after six weeks out, but were without José Antonio Chamot. Renato Buso was preferred to Roberto Rambaudi in midfield.
Roma were without Amedeo Carboni, had both Marco Delvecchio and Daniel Fonseca on the bench and played with Francesco Totti and Abel Balbo up front, with a strong muscular midfield.
Roma started on the front foot despite never really threatening Luca Marchegiani, he had to slap away an insidious cross by Vincent Candela but not much else. For Lazio, Diego Fuser was the most lively and he surged forward on the left, cut inside a fired a mid-height, well angled, right footed shot but Giovanni Cervone did well to parry it and Beppe Signori completely mishit the rebound.
The game was not spectacular with few goal scoring opportunities but it was at least fast and dynamic.
A goal however came somewhat unexpectedly in the 35th minute. Jonas Thern put an excellent low through ball behind the Lazio defence, Balbo was quicker to react than Beppe Favalli and was one-on-one with the keeper. What followed was both fortuitous and controversial. Marchegiani raced off his line and anticipated the Argentine striker but the ball then ricocheted off Balbo and went towards the goal line where Mark Fish sprinted back and seemed to clear it off the line with a lunging dive. On the line, over the line? The linesman had no doubts and pointed his flag towards the centre circle. Roma 1 Lazio 0. Lazio protested furiously but obviously to no avail. Halftime score Roma 1 Lazio 0.
An energetic if unspectacular first 45 minutes decided by a lucky and controversial goal.
There were no changes for the second half.
Lazio came back on with more positive intentions and attacked more. Casiraghi had a powerful left foot parried by Cervone. Roma however were dangerous on the break. Balbo's left foot was too weak from a favourable position.
In the 66th and 67th minutes came the first substitutions. For Lazio Roberto Rambaudi came on for a quiet Buso and, for the Giallorossi, Marco Delvecchio replaced a tired Balbo.
Delvecchio almost scored immediately when, set up by Totti, his diagonal, low, left foot shaved the post. Roma came close to putting the game out of Lazio’s reach.
In the 72nd minute Lazio replaced captain Signori with Igor Protti who had scored a hat-trick a week earlier.
The captaincy passed to Favalli but not for long. In the 77th minute he got a second yellow for a foul on Damiano Tommasi in midfield and was given his marching orders. One-nil down and in ten men, things were not looking good for the Eagles.
Rome had control of the game now and Totti hit the outside of the post with a low, right-footed strike. He was taken off soon after in the 82nd minute for a more defensive Antonino Bernardini.
Lazio did not give up and continued to push forward despite obviously risking being punished on the break.
The referee gave five minutes of additional time. In the second came a high cross into the Roma area from the left, Rambaudi not known for his heading skills jumped up and nodded the ball into the heart of the area where Protti lunged forward between the two central defenders and poked it past Cervone. Roma 1 Lazio 1.
Delirium in the Curva Nord and on the pitch where Protti re-enacted his "trenino" celebration used in his Bari days (crawling on all fours towards the corner flag followed by all his teammates, like a train) and under the Curva Sud!
The game was over. Roma 1 Lazio 1. A typical derby, intense, vibrant, exciting for those involved but lacking many goal scoring chances. Dino Zoff had got the substitutions right while Nils Liedholm's famous quote "si gioca meglio in 10" (one plays better in 10 men) today had been proven true.
Roma were kicking themselves for letting the three points slip away. Lazio were rampant, for the way it had come it was a draw that felt like a win. It would forever just be called "Il derby di Protti".
Who played Roma
Cervone, Pivotto, Petruzzi, Aldair, Candela, Tommasi, Di Biagio, Thern Statuto, Totti (82' Bernardini), Balbo (67' Delvecchio)
Substitutes: Berti, Moriero, Fonseca, Stovini, D. Conti
Manager: Sella
T.D: Liedholm
Who played for Lazio
Marchegiani, Negro, Fish, Grandoni, Favalli, Buso (66' Rambaudi), Fuser, Venturin, Nedved, Casiraghi, Signori (72' Protti)
Substitutes: Orsi, Marcolin, Nesta, Gottardi, Piovanelli
Manager: Zoff
Referee: Boggi
Goals: 35' Balbo, 90' Protti
Red card: 77' Favalli
What happened next
In the final five games of the season Lazio won three and drew two (away to Milan and Juventus). They managed to reach 4th place and a place in the following year’s UEFA Cup. A miracle.
Marchegiani was the player with most appearances (40) and Signori top goal scorer with 15 goals.
Let’s talk about Igor Protti
Igor Protti, together with Dario Hubner, is the only player to have been top season scorer in Serie A, Serie B and Serie C1. A remarkable feat.
He was born in Rimini on September 24, 1967 and started his footballing career in the youth teams of his hometown. He debuted professionally at 16 playing in C1. When he turned 18 he signed for Livorno still in C1 and stayed there for three years. He played regularly (83 games) but only started scoring with some consistency in his third year with 14 goals in all competitions. In 1988-89 he was loaned to Virescit Bergamo and had another positive season scoring 10 goals. In 1989 he signed for Messina in Serie B and scored 31 goals in three years.
His next step was an important one, he signed for Bari. They were in Serie B but after two years the Apulian side were promoted to Serie A. In his first three years he did not score much (22 goals in 79 league games) but in 1995-‘96 he finally exploded scoring 24 goals in Serie A, top scorer together with Beppe Signori.
Lazio President Sergio Cragnotti dreamed of putting these two players together, thinking that it would rain goals under manager Zdenek Zeman, so Protti joined Lazio, helped also by the fact that despite all his goals Bari had been relegated to Serie B. Unfortunately, it was not a good year for the Biancocelesti and half way through Zeman was replaced by Dino Zoff. He did score seven goals, including a last second goal against Roma in a derby with Lazio behind, but it was difficult to find the right balance up front with Signori and Pierluigi Casiraghi. With the arrival of Sven-Goran Eriksson in 1997, as well as the return of Alen Boksic plus the signing of Roberto Mancini, Protti was loaned to Napoli in Serie A to get some playing time. It was a terrible year for the Neapolitan club who arrived bottom with just 14 points. He returned briefly to Lazio but with the addition of Marcelo Salas he found very little space so he was loaned out again, this time to Reggiana in Serie B. Alas another relegation.
In 1999-00 he returned to Livorno in Serie C1. The year after he was top scorer in Serie C1, a feat he repeated in 2001-02 and the Amaranto were promoted to Serie B, returning to the second tier after 31 years. In 2002-03 he was top scorer in Serie B. In 2002-04, Livorno arrived third and were promoted to Serie A, 54 years after the last time they had played in the top tier. He scored 24 goals that season. He stayed one more year and Livorno managed to avoid relegation. He scored six league goals and at the end of the season decided to retire.
After he stopped playing he continued to work in football, first with Tuttocuoio (San Miniato-Pisa) and then back at Livorno as club manager. When the club went bust, he worked for the new Livorno team until 2022-23.
Protti was an incredible goal scorer. Not particularly tall, 1.71 metres, but he could be lethal in the penalty box. He scored 248 goals in his career and it was a pity that he arrived at Lazio in the wrong year.
Lazio Career
Season | Total appearances (goals) | Serie A | Coppa Italia | UEFA Cup |
1996-97 | 34 (7) | 27 (7) | 3 | 4 |
Jul-Oct 1998 | 3 | 2 | 1 | - |
Total | 37 (7) | 29 (7) | 4 | 4 |
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