Derby della Mole 1960s

Lore & Background

The match between the two clubs represented until the First World War the juxtaposition of two opposing social classes. Juventus, founded in 1897 by students of a prestigious high school in Turin, soon became akin to the bourgeois in the town especially after enduring bond with the Agnelli family, which began in 1923, during which time they were also supported by the aristocracy of the region. Torino instead was born in 1906 from a division within Juventus, at the hands of dissidents who joined forces with another team from the city, Football Club Torinese, who identified with the then-early industrial world. In the 1960s and 1970s, these differences had eased considerably, partly as a result of the great migration to Turin about forty years earlier, but did not disappear: Juventus has since transcended its status as the symbol of the bourgeois and elite class to become a global phenomenon while Torino still largely retains an exclusively local fanbase.

In Their Own Story

The floodlights at the Stadio Comunale hummed against the cool Turin night in late October 1964. The air smelled of damp earth and roasted chestnuts, carried on the wind from the stands packed with black-and-white stripes and red-and-blue scarves. As Giampiero Boniperti took a free kick, the roar was deafening—a unified wall of sound that transcended language. For ninety minutes, there were no neighbors, only warriors fighting for the soul of the city, every tackle echoing the history of two proud institutions.

Reader's Guide

The colours of the two teams also contribute, in small part, to this distinction: the Bianconeri, originally pink and black, adopted their jerseys from Notts County all the way from England, while the Granata dusted off the colours of the 'Brigade Savoia', that two centuries earlier had liberated the then capital of the Duchy of Savoy. Both clubs, however, featured within their emblems a raging bull, taken from the city's coat of arms: Juventus as a bond with their origins, while Torino adopted it as their identity. It was the case until 2017 when Juventus introduced a J-shaped logo and featured the bull no longer.

Did You Know?

• The Turin derby was first played on 13 January 1907.
• Torino was founded on 3 December 1906 through a merger of Football Club Torinese and a group of Juventus dissidents led by major financier Alfred Dick.
• Juventus have won the derby 110 times and Torino have won it 73 times as of 28 February 2023.
• The match with the most goals was Torino 8–6 Juventus on 19 February 1913.
• Torino's 2–1 victory on 26 April 2015 was their first derby success in twenty years.