F.C.D. Brera is an Italian football club in

Milan Milan ( , , Lombard: ; it, Milano ) is a city in northern Italy, capital of Lombardy, and the second-most populous city proper in Italy after Rome. The city proper has a population of about 1.4 million, while its metropolitan city h ...

, Lombardy, which plays in

Seconda Categoria The Seconda Categoria is a level of football in Italy. It is the 8th level (since 2014-15) in the Italian football league system. Each individual league winner within the Seconda Categoria level progresses to their closest regional league in the ...

Colours

Its colours are green and black.

History

Brera Football Club was founded in 2000 by the young publisher and journalist Alessandro Aleotti. The first manager appointed was former

Inter Inter may refer to: Association football clubs * Inter Milan, an Italian club * SC Internacional, a Brazilian club * Inter Miami CF, an American club * FC Inter Sibiu, a Romanian club * FC Inter Turku, a Finnish club * FK Inter Bratislava, a form ...

and Sampdoria goalkeeper

Walter Zenga Walter Zenga (; born 28 April 1960) is an Italian football manager and former player who last managed Serie A club Cagliari. He was a long-time goalkeeper for Inter Milan and the Italian national team. During his playing career, Zenga was pa ...

. The team played its matches in the newly reopened

Arena Civica Arena Civica (), officially Arena Gianni Brera, is a multi-purpose stadium in Milan, Italy, which was opened on 18 August 1807. One of the city's main examples of neoclassical architecture, today it mainly hosts football and rugby union games, c ...

, but was relegated from

Serie D The Serie D () is the top level of semi-professional football in the country. The fourth tier of the Italian league system, the competition sits beneath the third professional league, Serie C. It is administered by the Lega Nazionale Dilettant ...

. In the season 2003/2004, through a partnership with the

FIGC The Italian Football Federation ( it, Federazione Italiana Giuoco Calcio; FIGC), known colloquially as ''Federcalcio'', is the governing body of football in Italy. It is based in Rome and the technical department is in Coverciano, Florence. It ...

and Carcere di Opera (one of the biggest

prison A prison, also known as a jail, gaol (dated, standard English, Australian, and historically in Canada), penitentiary (American English and Canadian English), detention center (or detention centre outside the US), correction center, corre ...

s in

and in

Italy Italy ( it, Italia ), officially the Italian Republic, ) or the Republic of Italy, is a country in Southern Europe. It is located in the middle of the Mediterranean Sea, and its territory largely coincides with the homonymous geographical ...

), Brera founded FreeOpera Brera, a team composed of

detainee Detention is the process whereby a state or private citizen lawfully holds a person by removing their freedom or liberty at that time. This can be due to (pending) criminal charges preferred against the individual pursuant to a prosecution or t ...

s. Allowed to take part to 2003/2004

Terza Categoria The Terza Categoria is the lowest level of amateur football in Italy. It is the ninth level in the Italian football league system. Each individual league winner within the Terza Categoria level progresses to their closest regional league in th ...

, the team won the championship and was promoted to

. The initiative obtained a lot of praise and

RAI RAI – Radiotelevisione italiana (; commercially styled as Rai since 2000; known until 1954 as Radio Audizioni Italiane) is the national public broadcasting company of Italy, owned by the Ministry of Economy and Finance. RAI operates many ter ...

talked about it in a "Sfide" episode. In the season 2006/2007 Brera, under the leading of coach Noureddine Zekri, obtained its first promotion, beating Bresso in the playoff and gaining the right to take part to Promozione the following season. In the season 2011/2012, after temporarily ceasing the first team's activity, Brera took part to the

Torneo di Viareggio The Torneo di Viareggio ( en, Viareggio Tournament), officially named the Viareggio Cup World Football Tournament Coppa Carnevale, is a youth association football tournament held annually in the commune of Viareggio, Italy and its surrounding are ...

under the name of Brera Emergence Gabon, a team composed of young

Gabon Gabon (; ; snq, Ngabu), officially the Gabonese Republic (french: République gabonaise), is a country on the west coast of Central Africa. Located on the equator, it is bordered by Equatorial Guinea to the northwest, Cameroon to the nort ...

ian footballers. In the season 2014/2015 the team, with Andrea Mazza appointed as coach, won its first championship, getting promoted from

Prima Categoria The Prima Categoria is a level of football in Italy. It is the seventh level (since 2014–15) in the Italian football league system and is organized by the National Amateur League by the Regional Committees. Each individual league winner within ...

. In January 2016, in collaboration with the Serbian Roma actress and activist Dijana Pavlovic, Brera started managing the Romani People football team. From 2016/2017 Brera played in

Eccellenza The Eccellenza (, "excellence") is the fifth level (since 2014–15) of Italian football. It is a regional league, composed of 28 divisions divided geographically. All 20 regions are represented by at least one division except for Piedmont and A ...

and Enzo Gambaro has been appointed as new coach. Due to a poor beginning of season, in October 2016 Enzo Gambaro has resigned and has been replaced with former Brera manager Andrea Mazza. The season ended with the team's relegation and Andrea Mazza's resignment. In July Andrea Valle was appointed as new coach. The 2017/2018 season saw some changes on the roster side, as it was mostly composed by young foreign players: the adaption to the league was hard and, despite some outstanding performances, the team eventually got relegated. In August 2018 Marco Resca was appointed as new coach of the team now facing the

division. After a promising start, the team went through some tough time and in March, after Resca's resignation, former

AS Roma ' (''Rome Sport Association''), commonly referred to as Roma (), is a professional Association football, football club based in Rome, Italy. Founded by a merger in 1927, Roma has participated in the top tier of Italian football for all of its ...

defender Amedeo Mangone came in as new coach and led the team so a smooth season ending. The following season, with former Brera legend Marco Nichetti in charge of the team, was affected by the

COVID-19 pandemic The COVID-19 pandemic, also known as the coronavirus pandemic, is an ongoing global pandemic of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2). The novel virus was first identi ...

, which suspended the ongoing championship. In September 2020 Amedeo Mangone agreed on resuming his activity as Brera head coach.

Notable managers

* Noureddine Zekri * Enzo Gambaro * Andrea Mazza * Marco Nichetti * Marco Nicoletti *

* Amedeo Mangone

Notable players

* Dario Drudi *

Sergio D'Autilia Sergio D'Autilia (born 20 August 1977) is an Italian former professional footballer who played as a forward. He made his fully professional club debut for Inter Milan in the 1996–97 Coppa Italia on 6 November 1996 against Cagliari. While h ...

* Guido Corteggiano * Andrea Merenda * Martín Belforti * José Belforti * Maximiliano Martinez

External links

Official Website

References

{{Reflist Football clubs in Milan Football clubs in Italy Association football clubs established in 2000 2000 establishments in Italy