Fiorentina have finally come to fruition with the unveiling of Viola Park, the state-of-the-art training facility that is set to challenge some of the most modern football settings in the world. The senior, youth, and women’s teams will train at Viola Park side-by-side, and club chief Rocco Commisso hopes it will make budding players choose the Viola instead of Juventus.
📽️💜⚜️#forzaviola #fiorentina #violapark pic.twitter.com/cPh0YN77cR
— ACF Fiorentina (@acffiorentina) October 11, 2023
Viola Park bears the name Rocco Commisso Training Center, and the executive himself is proud of the fact that Fiorentina now have something of their own.
“For me it is a great emotion, I didn’t come to Italy to do this thing but then the mayor of Bagno a Ripoli told me: ‘We could build a sports centre.’ We were supposed to spend €60M, but it cost more than double. We see why: we have twelve fields and I’m proud to be able to have women train too. I’m very happy.”
The lack of investments in Italian football is a cause for concern, but Commisso hopes this is the beginning.
“After a short time, I understood that the club had nothing, neither the stadium nor the pitches. Nothing truly belonged to us. Now they get excited to come here in the afternoon after school, I rejoice to see them like this. We have kids who come from Grosseto, Lucca, from all over Tuscany, not just those who are in boarding schools. At least they see a beautiful place after traveling three hours to come here and go back. I believe and hope that someone seeing this will want to come to Fiorentina and not Juventus.” (via ViolaNews)
The training facility is established in the Bagno a Ripoli area, southeast of Florence, on the banks of the Arno river. The foundation stone was set in October 2019, and was opened to the public for the first time on September 30 for Fiorentina Primavera against Milan Primavera, with 1,185 fans in attendance.
Commisso: "Spero che col Viola Park ci sia chi preferirà la Fiorentina alla Juventus" https://t.co/lci3LWM8eE
— TUTTOmercatoWEB (@TuttoMercatoWeb) October 11, 2023
Commisso welcomed a delegation of high-profile officials at the inauguration of Viola Park, including Italy coach Luciano Spalletti and UEFA President Aleksandr Ceferin.
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