A Rome derby on the penultimate weekend of a Serie A season could never be a low-stakes occasion. Scudetto wins come rarely in Italy’s capital city – Roma and Lazio have only five between them – leaving neighbourly bragging rights as the next-most important prize on offer. It is an intense, bitter rivalry that has produced countless iconic moments – from Francesco Totti taking selfies under the Curva to a cup-winning to a cup-winning goal by Senad Lulic – if sadly also many violent clashes between supporters.

And, of course, it matters more when either side has tangible objectives left to play for. As recently as late April that did not appear very likely. Roma were sixth – five points adrift of the Champions League places – and Lazio ninth. But then the Giallorossi got on a roll, just as Milan and Juventus started dropping points. A win in the derby now could propel them into the top four, if either of those sides slipped up again.

Lazio’s own hopes of qualifying for Europe had been dashed when they lost the Coppa Italia final to Inter on Wednesday. But misery loves company, and denying Roma’s ambitions would be a worthy consolation. All of which made it more astonishing that, one day before the game, nobody seemed sure if their manager would even show up.

Maurizio Sarri had warned after the cup defeat that he might not. At the time it was unclear which day the derby would take place. A clash with the men’s singles and women’s doubles finals of the Italian Open tennis tournament, taking place just a few hundred metres outside the Stadio Olimpico, within the city’s grandiose Foro Italico sports complex, had thrown the entire schedule of Serie A games into chaos.

The derby was originally designated by the league as a 12.30pm Sunday kick-off. But on Tuesday the Rome prefect announced that it would be pushed back to the following Monday, at 8.45pm, instead. The local authority had concluded that it would simply be too difficult to guarantee public safety with both events happening at once. Even Italy’s Minister of the Interior, Matteo Piantedosi, got involved, insisting this was the “only viable solution”.

Such a short-notice rearrangement, however, would not only impact Roma and Lazio. The league’s rules require that any teams competing for the same targets during the final two rounds of a season must have their games kick-off simultaneously. Napoli, Juventus, Milan and Como were still fighting with Roma for those last two Champions League spots, so all their fixtures would need to be rescheduled too.

A logistical nightmare, above all for travelling supporters. The league’s organising body – Lega Serie A – launched an urgent legal appeal against the postponement to the regional administrative court.

The matter was still unresolved when Lazio played Inter in the Coppa Italia final on Wednesday, losing 2-0. Sarri, who has vocally opposed all lunchtime kick-offs for about as long as he has coached top-flight football teams, suggested he would boycott the derby if it reverted to the original schedule.

“If it’s on Monday I’ll come,” he said. “If it’s Sunday at 12.30pm I won’t … If I was the [Lazio] president [Claudio Lotito] I wouldn’t have the team show up either, and we’ll take a point penalty. These teams are competing for the Champions League – worth €80m – and they’re going to play at 12.30pm? This isn’t football.”

In fact, the game would wind up being moved even earlier. The courts returned the issue to the league and the Rome prefect, telling them to sort it out themselves. Finally, on Thursday, it was agreed that the derby – along with Como v Parma, Genoa v Milan, Juventus v Fiorentina, and Pisa v Napoli, would all kick off on Sunday, at midday – that extra half hour apparently easing concerns about the policing of events in the capital.

There are more layers to this story, encompassing the booming popularity of tennis in Italy and breathtaking organisational inertia from Serie A’s organisers and local authorities in Rome. This clash has been foreseeable since the fixture list was published last June, how could it take until the week of the game to address it?

At some point, though, this column needs to get on to the football. Sarri did turn up in the end, though Lazio’s supporters mostly did not – Ultras staging yet another boycott in protest against Lotito’s ownership. Roma were the designated home team, and their fans made the most of having the place to themselves, creating a boisterously one-sided atmosphere.

The game was predictably scrappy, high on commitment but low on standout quality. Lazio thought they had taken the lead through Boulaye Dia midway through the first half, but in fact he was a mile offside. Instead, the Roma centre-back Gianluca Mancini put his team in front before half-time with a header from Niccolò Pisilli’s corner.

He ran the length of the pitch, away from Lazio’s deserted Curva Nord, to celebrate with Roma’s Ultras at the opposite end. A fan favourite, Mancini joined the Giallorossi from Atalanta in 2019 and had won supporters over with his full-blooded commitment at centre-back long before he scored the winner in another derby, back in April 2024.

Now 30 years old, he has made 20 appearances for the Italian national team but still never played in the Champions League, having arrived in the summer after Roma’s last participation. That might finally be about to change.

Mancini sealed Roma’s 2-0 victory with another header, from another corner, in the 66th minute. This time he appeared more confused than excited as the ball went in. “I couldn’t even believe I had scored again,” he confessed afterward. “I didn’t know how to celebrate.”

By now the mood inside the Stadio Olimpico was transforming from cauldron to carnival – even as both teams had a player sent off for an on-field scuffle. Juventus were losing 1-0 at home to Fiorentina. Before long, word would come through that they had conceded again, Rolando Mandragora serving the killer blow.

As the full-time whistles went, Roma were up to fourth – on course for their first Champions League qualification in seven years. A scenario that seemed implausible less than a month ago, when their season appeared to be coming apart amid an escalating power struggle between the Roma manager, Gian Piero Gasperini, and his predecessor, Claudio Ranieri, still serving as senior adviser to the club’s owners.

But then Ranieri left, and Roma, after a miserable spring, got back on track. They have beaten Bologna, Fiorentina, Parma and Lazio in consecutive games – their longest winning run in Serie A all season. One more victory, away to relegated Verona, would guarantee them a spot in the top four.

They savoured the moment, lingering in the sunshine that bathed the Olimpico. Gasperini was in the middle of it, grinning, hugging, physically shoving players under the Curva to receive the adulation they merited. For some, including Paulo Dybala, who provided the assist for the second goal, this might have been a final home game.

Gasperini was not a universally popular appointment last summer, having needled Roma supporters during his almost decade-long stint as a rival at Atalanta. He said on Sunday that, when he accepted the job, he had given himself three years to start winning things.

“I knew I was the least well-suited candidate to create a bond with the people here,” continued Gasperini. “I came to make a team play football, and I think I’ve been appreciated for that. The most important thing for me, beyond the result, is having earned that credibility with the fans. That’s worth more than a Scudetto.”