In some countries, the capital clubs dominate the local football scene.
But in many larger nations like England, Germany, France and Italy, that has not been the case traditionally, even if the capital clubs in all but Germany have enjoyed some measure of success.
In Italy, the Northern clubs from Turin and Milan have dominated when it comes to Serie A titles with Juventus and Torino winning 40 between them and AC Milan and Inter Milan triumphing a combined 36 times.
On the other hand, Rome's Big Two have only won five Scudetti between them - Roma with three and Lazio winning twice.
On this week's Team 33, I was joined by renowned Serie A football writer James Horncastle, who will be in Dublin on March 19th for a Totally Football Show live podcast broadcast at Vicar Street, and we focused on the Rome clubs including that anomaly when they won consecutive league titles in 2000 (Lazio) and 2001 (Roma), breaking up the Juventus-Milan league title sequence and briefly putting Rome at the pinnacle of the domestic football map.
So why has Rome been so far behind the Northern clubs? What sort of club would Roma be now if they had beaten Liverpool on penalties in the 1984 European Cup final in their own stadium? How they did get to the top at the start of the Millennium? And why did Roma and Lazio both fail to build on that league success?
We got Horncastle's take on all those questions on the podcast.
You can listen back on the podcast player or stream/download on iTunes:
Recent interviews on Team 33 include former Man United cult hero Andrei Kanchelskis, ex-England international Carlton Palmer, former Newcastle and Everton left back Alessandro Pistone, Chelsea legends Bobby Tambling and Paddy Mulligan, Dutch legend Johan Neeskens, ex-England striker Darius Vassell, Liverpool legend David Fairclough, former Ireland midfielder Mark Kinsella and former Everton forward Tomasz Radzinski. Plus our in-depth chats with Tony Coton, Packie Bonner, Nobby Solano, Ron Atkinson and Alan Curbishley are still available on iTunes. You can find them all in one place by subscribing to Team 33 on iTunes.
