Ribaltone del Labriola, sconfitta la favorita Crystal Palace al trofeo Città di Grosseto

Ribaltone del Labriola, sconfitta la favorita Crystal Palace al trofeo Città di Grosseto

ROSELLE – Nel calcio vince spesso chi è più forte, nel calcio amatoriale vince spesso chi merita. Così il tabellone principale del trofeo Città di Grosseto di calcio a 7, la manifestazione principe dell’estate maremmana, va meritatamente al Labriola, che batte 2-1 il Crystal Palace favorito alla vigilia.

A Roselle, impianto splendido e spalti gremiti, il Crystal Palace parte forte e va in vantaggio con De Carolis. Ma il Labriola non molla, resta in partita, trovando il pareggio con Vento.

Nella ripresa meglio la squadra di Fallani, il Crystal Palace si innervosisce e a farne le spese è Gigi Consonni, cacciato a metà tempo per due cartellini gialli in successione: prima per l’ennesima protesta nei confronti dell’arbitro Tiberi (ottima la sua direzione in un match nervoso e non semplice), poi per un inutile fallo a centrocampo. E’ l’episodio che spacca in due la partita, perché con l’uomo in meno il Crystal Palace reagisce benissimo nei cinque minuti di penalità, poi però paga lo sforzo e subisce il gol partita segnato da Majuri che regala il trionfo al Labriola.

“Abbiamo tenuto bene il campo contro una squadra fortissima, la più forte del calcio Uisp – afferma Riccardo Fallani, storico mister del Labriola – sapevamo di dover correre e con tanto impegno abbiamo ottenuto questa bellissima vittoria contro una squadra che non avevamo mai battuto”.

“E’ una bella estate per il calcio a 5 Uisp – afferma Francesco Luzzetti, presidente della lega calcio – con tanti tornei in tutta la provincia. Ci auguriamo di poter ripartire a settembre con il calcio a 11, dopo due anni ce n’è davvero bisogno”.

LABRIOLA: Allegro, Cardelli, Vigni, Majuri, Pecciarini, Cappelloni, Liberali, Fallani, Vento, Bicocchi. All. Falciani.

CRYSTAL PALACE: Nunziatini, De Carolis, Capitani, W. Consonni, Hudorovich, Galloni, Briaschi, Silvestro, L. Consonni. All. Menichetti.

ARBITRO: Tiberi.

RETI: De Carolis, Vento, Majuri.

NOTE: espulso L. Consonni.

Bringing down ‘The Sopranos’ for the FBI destroyed my life

After the feds arrested a capo and nine other goodfellas from New Jersey’s DeCavalcante crime family in 2015, the undercover FBI agent who’d infiltrated their outfit looked forward to his next assignment.

Instead, Giovanni Rocco went into hiding.

Some of the mobsters Rocco had gone after didn’t get arrested or were sprung, and they all lived in his close-knit community of Elizabeth, NJ. The DeCavalcantes were no joke — they were said to have been the inspiration for HBO hit “The Sopranos” — and many of them were angry at Rocco for taking down his tough-talking target, Charlie “The Hat” Stango. Particularly aggrieved was Patricia, Stango’s longtime girlfriend, who after the arrests moved into a house right around the corner from Rocco’s home, where the agent lived with his wife and kids.

Rocco had to hole up, like a mob rat, as his FBI bosses mulled how to prevent him from getting whacked. He grew a thick beard to disguise his appearance and taught his kids to be as watchful as G-men.

“I was being treated like a gangster,” Rocco told The Post of his time laying low, which he details in his new book “Giovanni’s Ring” (Chicago Review Press), out now. “My house had to become a fortress. I was isolated. I couldn’t work any new cases because of the level of exposure. The whole thing was just a nightmare.”

FBI agent Giovanni Rocco posed as the outlaw biker “Giovanni Gatto” (above) to infiltrate the DeCavalcante crime family in New Jersey. Courtesy of Giovanni Rocco

The fear of reprisal took a toll on his wife and young children, whose names he can’t disclose in order to protect them, he writes. (Giovanni Rocco is not the author’s real name.)

“They were trained to be suspicious of everyone,” he writes. “If a Lincoln Town Car or a Cadillac turned into our street, we would be on pins and needles.”

The case didn’t even start out as a Mafia probe.

It began with a 2012 drug investigation of James “Jimmy Smalls” Heeney, a coke dealer from Elizabeth with ties to the Bloods street gang whom the FBI wanted Rocco to engage, he writes.

Arranging a buy with Heeney was hardly new territory for Rocco, who presented himself as “Giovanni Gatto,” an outlaw biker-turned-wiseguy with a gaudy pinky ring — the character he’d forged years earlier in a previous narcotics sting.

Rocco and another agent met up with Heeney in Atlantic City, buying a 200-gram “sampler” of coke at a casino steakhouse. The dealer came across as greedy, and that gave the agents an idea. Instead of using government money to buy the drugs, why not take advantage of an FBI warehouse stacked with counterfeit designer clothing the agency had seized?

Simone DeCavalcante, a.k.a. Sam the Plumber (right), was the alleged godfather of the crime family, which inspired the “Sopranos” Bettmann Archive

Rocco traded his swag, supplemented by contraband cigarettes, for Heeney’s cocaine, and the abundance of fancy shoes and shirts gave Rocco mob status as an earner, which ultimately led to an offer he couldn’t refuse — the chance to get “made” and become an official member of the DeCavalcante mob.

And it came because the family’s top capos trusted Rocco more than one of their own.

Luigi “Lui the Dog” Oliveri was Heeney’s coke supplier and a guy with big plans for himself. But Lui also irritated his seniors in the organization — he once mocked veteran hit man Joseph “Tin Ear” Sclafani by poking him in the belly, Rocco told The Post.

“The Dog was aptly named,” Rocco writes. “He looked like a soup sandwich — overweight, droopy eyelids, and sloppily dressed in a wrinkled baby-blue shirt, faded jeans, and a scruffy cloth cap.”

Still, Rocco did business with both Oliveri and Heeney — and found himself being romanced by each.

Both the DeCavalcante Mafia clan and the characters of HBO’s “The Sopranos” were based in the Peterson area of New Jersey. Alamy

Once, Oliveri invited Rocco to an old-school Italian feast in the Peterson section of Elizabeth, and he accepted. Rocco returned home that night, quickly removing his bejeweled ring as if to shed his Mafia alter ego, only to turn on the TV and learn that actor James Gandolfini had died and a tribute to the “Sopranos” star was playing.

I was being treated like a gangster. My house had to become a fortress. agent on going deep undercover to bring down a crime family

“Unnervingly, some of the clips they showed had been filmed in the same Peterson neighborhood I had just left,” he writes. “And many of them reminded me of the true nature of the world I now inhabited: a world without honor, whose inhabitants could easily refer to me as ‘our friend’ today and, without a moment’s thought, put a bullet in my head tomorrow.”

Living in the same town as the goodfellas he’d infiltrated led to some terrifying moments.

In 2014, Danny “Gooms” Bertelli, a mobster the agent knew from the Gambino family, which oversaw the DeCavalcantes, spotted Rocco at his daughter’s soccer tournament, he writes.

“Giovanni? What the f–k? Whaddya doing here?” Bertelli asked.

Charlie “The Hat” Stango ran New Jersey’s DeCavalcante crime family until he was busted by FBI agent Rocco and sent to prison for a decade. Facebook

Dressed in cargo shorts and a T-shirt and “looking nothing like Giovanni Gatto,” the agent made up a story of stepping in to help an ex-girlfriend with a daughter whose dad was in jail. He wasn’t sure if the Gambino soldier had seen him with his wife, kids and his parents.

“I had been blissfully, stupidly unplugged, enjoying my family, and oblivious to my surroundings,” he writes. “I had not only endangered the entire operation, I had endangered my family.”

Even so, Rocco earned the DeCavalcante family’s trust. He finally met Stango and the two hit it off.

The boss took him under his wing. For nearly a year they hung out together — both in New Jersey and Henderson, Nev., where Stango had relocated with Patricia, running a legit business and a variety of criminal schemes.

Rocco lived in Elizabeth, NJ, right alongside the crime family he helped take down. Getty Images

Stango trusted the agent enough to put him in charge of a street crew. But when Stango became fed up with the bombastic Lui the Dog and ordered Rocco to whack him, the FBI decided it was time to wrap up “Operation Charlie Horse.”

Rocco admitted feeling sorry for the man he was about to send to jail.

“I wanted so badly to tell him,” Rocco writes. “I wanted to say, ‘Charl, make a phone call. Turn yourself in now. Make a deal. Keep yourself out of jail. I am so sorry.’ How sad is that?”

Rocco went into hiding after Stango was arrested. Now he and his family are in witness protection, living under assumed names. Courtesy of Giovanni Rocco

Busted at his home in Henderson, Stango was charged with conspiracy to commit murder among other crimes. The recordings Rocco had made of their conversations proved devastating.

Stango pleaded guilty to the murder count in 2016. The feds agreed to drop the other charges and sent the 77-year-old capo to prison for 10 years. All nine of Stango’s cohorts including Oliveri and Heeney also copped and took guilty pleas. (Stango is now locked up at a federal pen in Jesup, Ga., and set to get out on March 21, 2024.)

For nine months after the takedown, Rocco lived in fear. He couldn’t work. He couldn’t leave the house, not with Stango’s girlfriend, Patricia, living so close to him in Elizabeth.

The FBI didn’t know what to do with him. But when his handlers accepted the danger of the situation, he got a call and was told he and his family had just four hours to pack their bags and bolt.

“We left our house with toys on the floor,” Rocco said.

The family was whisked off to a safe house and then put into witness protection, with new identities and a new home far from Elizabeth, NJ.

Putting agents into witness protection is rare, Rocco said.

“I was the first task force officer that it ever happened to,” he said. “Once I left I couldn’t come back for anything, even a funeral for a guy I worked with. I felt like what a gangster feels when he goes to jail, to lose everything. That hurt.”

Even now, he can’t reveal his whereabouts. Retired, he has limited contact with friends and family members.

Meanwhile, the possibility of retaliation from the DeCavalcante mob, now carrying on under new boss Charles “Big Ears” Majuri, according to Rocco, never goes away.

“The necessity for each of us to be vigilant,” he writes, “continues to this day.”

Henri, 28, istuutui Spike Leen ja Jasper Pääkkösen viereen terassilla – ohjaajalegendalla oli yksi ehto yhteiskuvalle

Henri, 28, istuutui Spike Leen ja Jasper Pääkkösen viereen terassilla – ohjaajalegendalla oli yksi ehto yhteiskuvalle

– Ajattelin, että nyt on kerran elämässä -tilaisuus, tamperelainen Henri kuvailee tilannetta.

Henri Majuri ei jättänyt ainutkertaista tilaisuutta käyttämättä.

Ohjaajalegenda Spike Leen Suomen-vierailu on herättänyt laajasti huomiota. Spike Lee on muun muassa illallistanut helsinkiläisravintolassa sekä tavannut tasavallan presidentti Sauli Niinistön.

Sunnuntaina ohjaaja pistäytyi näyttelijä Jasper Pääkkösen kanssa Pääkkösen omistamassa Löyly-ravintolassa Helsingissä.

Paikalla ollut tamperelainen Henri Majuri, 28, bongasi kaksikon istumasta terassilla ja päätti mennä juttusille.

– Ajattelin, että nyt on kerran elämässä -tilaisuus, kun harvemmin kansainvälistä tähteä tulee livenä nähtyä. Menin kohteliaasti kysymään, saisinko yhteiskuvan ja kenties istua pöytään hetkeksi, kiinteistövälittäjänä työskentelevä Henri kertoo.

Hyväntuulinen Spike Lee murjaisi vastaukseksi vitsikkään ehdon.

– Lee totesi, että voidaan ottaa kuva, jos vastaan yhteen kysymykseen. Hän kysyi minulta, mikä on minun suosikki NBA-joukkueeni.

Vannoutuneena koripallojoukkue New York Knicksin fanina tunnetulla ohjaajalla oli päässään joukkueen fanilippis.

– Huomasin hänen lippiksensä ja vastasin, että tietysti New York Knicks. Hän nyökkäsi vastaukselleni ja toivotti tervetulleeksi pöytään, Henri naurahtaa.

Heillä riitti juteltavaa, sillä Henri itse pelaa tamperelaisessa Koriorit-koripallojoukkueessa ja hänellä oli päällään joukkueensa pelipaita.

– Pääkkönen käänsi joukkueen nimen ohjaajalle englanniksi ”Basket Stallions”. Vaihdoimme pari sanaa koriksesta, ja kiittelin lohikeitosta.

– Aluksi jännitin, miten he suhtautuvat lähestymiseeni, mutta he olivatkin todella mukavia herroja molemmat.

Henrin mukaan Lee ja Pääkkönen käänsivät katseita ravintolassa, mutta moni ei heitä lähestynyt.

– Aika moni heitä vilkuili, mutta aika harva uskalsi mennä juttelemaan. Näin, että yksi ihminen kysyi lupaa kuvaan, mutta ei itse mennyt samaan kuvaan heidän kanssaan, Henri sanoo.

Huippuohjaaja saapui Suomeen suoraan Cannesin elokuvafestivaaleilta, joissa hän toimi tuomariston puheenjohtajana.

Jasper Pääkkönen kertoi IS:lle, että Lee on Suomessa hänen vieraanaan.

– Hän tuli Cannesista Suomeen kylään, ihan vain jatkumona meidän aikaisemmille tapaamisille ja yhteistyölle, Pääkkönen kertoi.

Näyttelijän mukaan kaksikko aikoo muun muassa suunnata saunomaan Pääkkösen omistamaan saunakompleksiin.

Maanantaina Spike Lee ja Jasper Pääkkönen tapasivat tasavallan presidentti Sauli Niinistön ja istuskelivat presidentin virka-asunnon terassilla.

Pääkkönen kertoi IS:lle ilmoittaneensa presidentin kansliaan ohjaajan vierailusta.

– Ajattelin, että on syytä ilmoittaa hänen Suomen-vierailustaan myös presidentin kansliaan, sillä Niinistö ja Spike tapasivat lentokoneessa viimeksi, kun Spike lensi Suomesta.

– Yhteydenottoni johti tapaamiseen, joka oli rento ja epämuodollinen tilaisuus Mäntyniemessä. Keskustelunaiheena olivat tietysti elokuvat, Pääkkönen kertoi.

Lue lisää: Jasper Pääkkönen kertoo IS:lle Spike Leen Suomen-vierailun suunnitelmista – yhtä asiaa he eivät jätä välistä

Spike Lee ja Jasper Pääkkönen ovat tunteneet jo tovin. Pääkkönen sai ensimmäisen merkittävän elokuvaroolinsa Hollywoodissa, kun Lee pestasi hänet BlacKkKlansman-elokuvaansa vuonna 2018.