an excerpt from the book by Roberto Saviano- Corriere.it

The others had nothing to complain about. The guy who had thrown Giuseppe to the ground stood in front of him to make a barrier. Dario took a half step back, looked at Rino, further ahead, as if he wanted to kick towards him, but instead hit the Maranese in the chest. The ball bounced, only half damped, and before the opponent understood what was happening Dario took the ball back and launched into a furious race towards the goal of the rival team. A defender tried to block him, but he put the ball between his legs and kept running.

“Go! Go! It goes’!” Giovanni shouted. On the wall around the clearing all the boys of the neighborhood sat, half a dozen adults and, alone, with his legs apart and his arms crossed in front of his chest, Tonino Porcello. The result was 2 to 1 for the Maranese, only a few minutes were left to remedy. The spectators also began to shout: “Go, Dario, go!”, Overwhelmed by the gracefulness of that action.

By now in front of Dario there were only a defender and the goalkeeper, who came out of the goalposts. At that moment, a few steps from the door, he was shaken by a surge of inspiration. He would have done exactly what he had seen the Brazilian striker Evair do a few days earlier in Atalanta-Juventus. The Nerazzurri, a tender one-meter-ninety high rascal who was a steady couple with Caniggia, had dribbled the whole defense and had gone directly to the goal, unleashing the furious applause of the Atalanta fans. Dario even resembled him, to Evair.

He stopped for a very quick moment, just long enough to register the position of the defender and the goalkeeper, then resumed running with a sharp change of trajectory. The opponent attempted a slip by peeling one knee, but it was useless. Dario was already over. Between him and the door, now, there was only the porter and, in the ears, the heartbeat that galloped, charged with all the adrenaline of youth, which does not correspond to an age but to the instant in which the body exceeds its limits thanks to the freedom of the spirit. While his foot ran through the dust glued to the ball, Dario was the strongest because his heart was pure, wide open to the ecstasy of the game.

“Go, Dario, go!” they shouted from the wall, all standing waving their arms, wriggling like clothes hanging in the air on a libeccio evening.
“Go! Go! It goes’!” shouted Rino, Giuseppe and Giovanni. Dario slowed down, he and the porter looked at each other with hatred. There was no more than a meter and a half left between them. He did not notice the police car approaching the building. Neither of the first, nor of the second, which followed a few meters away. She did not even notice the shouts: «’O balloon! ‘O ball! ” that came from his teammates and that mingled with those coming from the spectators. Who, now, were also shouting: «’O balloon! ‘O balloon! ».

In the general turmoil, the kids began to run away and scream, terrified, because Dario didn’t make up his mind to throw the ball, triggering the usual alarm mechanism.
“Dario, ‘o ball!” his friends shouted “votta stu balloon!”. But he, nothing.

Then they started running towards the arcades, then towards the buildings, shouting «’O football! ‘O ball! », Trying to remedy the defect of his friend who was now stunned in front of the goal, alone, without even the opposing goalkeeper. But he didn’t help. An imperfect ritual is a vain ritual, and such was the one to which Tonino Porcello witnessed helplessly, while Dario, now alone in front of the door, listlessly kicked the Super Santos making him just pass the goalposts and whispering between his teeth, with his eyes down, a a word that no one heard: “Gol”.

The stampede of the pushers started out of phase, the holes, the boxes, the cavities in which to hide the stuff burst open awkwardly, the alarm cry given without there being any ball to recover – but, indeed, while the ball was still standing in the field – did nothing but incite the cops by luring them into the fort. The boys were all identified. The police arrested several drug dealers, blocked some women who tried in vain to hide hundreds of coke sachets. The fortress was conquered. Tonino’s reign was taken. At least for a day.

In Milan the meeting with the author

«Pure heart. Four friends. Four fates. One Passion »by Roberto Saviano leaves Giunti on Wednesday 9 November. The novel (pp. 168, euro 16) is the rewrite of the short story “Super Santos” which appeared in the collection “The ball is round” of 2005 (published by Ancora del Mediterraneo), then released in 2011 as a separate volume for editions of the «Corriere della Sera» and, in 2012, in digital version by Feltrinelli. Saviano will sign copies of “Pure Heart” on Sunday 13 November in Milan (11.30 am) at the Feltrinelli in Piazza Duomo