Some friendships between ultras are announced with banners and disappear after only a few seasons. Others are built gradually through repeated journeys, personal relationships and a shared understanding of terrace culture. The connection between Sampdoria’s Ultras Tito Cucchiaroni and Marseille’s Commando Ultra 84 belongs to the second category.
The relationship began in Genoa on 4 January 1987, when a delegation from Marseille attended Sampdoria’s goalless draw with Roma at the Stadio Luigi Ferraris. What started as an opportunity for the French group to observe one of Italy’s established ultras scenes developed into one of the best-known cross-border friendships involving supporters from the two Mediterranean cities. It is important, however, to define the relationship accurately. This was primarily a friendship between Ultras Tito Cucchiaroni and Commando Ultra 84, rather than an alliance automatically recognised by every organised group supporting Sampdoria or Olympique de Marseille.
Two Groups from Different Generations
Ultras Tito Cucchiaroni were founded in 1969 and belong to the pioneering generation of the Italian ultras movement. The group took its name from Argentine forward Ernesto “Tito” Cucchiaroni, who represented Sampdoria between 1958 and 1963. UTC are also widely regarded as one of the first organised supporter groups to use the word “Ultras” in their official name. Commando Ultra 84 emerged in Marseille fifteen years later. Founded on 31 August 1984 during a home match against Racing Paris, CU84 became the first major ultras group at Olympique de Marseille and one of the earliest organised groups of its kind in France. Its founders looked towards Italy, where coordinated chanting, large flags, banners, smoke and carefully prepared displays were already central parts of terrace culture.
Members of the young Marseille group consequently began visiting Italian stadiums. Their journeys were not simply football tourism. They wanted to understand how established groups organised their sections, led chants, prepared material and maintained collective support throughout an entire match. That search brought them to Genoa in January 1987. The presence of French-speaking members among the Sampdoria ultras made communication easier, but the relationship was built through more than language. The visitors discovered a group whose approach to supporting its club closely matched what they wanted to develop in Marseille.
From Inspiration to Friendship
During the first phase of the relationship, CU84 learned from the greater experience of Ultras Tito. Members observed how the Gradinata Sud was organised, how songs were coordinated and why flags were expected to remain in motion throughout the match. They also studied the preparation of banners and choreographies, as well as the responsibility carried by those leading the stand. The lessons were adapted to Marseille rather than simply copied. CU84 gradually developed its own identity at the Vélodrome, shaped by the character of the city and the distinctive intensity of Olympique de Marseille’s support. Italian influence provided an important foundation, but the group transformed it into something recognisably Marseillais.
Regular contact soon turned observation into genuine friendship. Genoa lies roughly 400 kilometres from Marseille, making repeated journeys possible even when they demanded considerable commitment. Members sometimes returned from long Marseille away trips in France, dropped off their belongings and immediately continued towards Genoa for a Sampdoria match. Some Marseille ultras became regular enough visitors to hold Sampdoria season tickets. Others travelled to Genoa even when no match was being played, staying with friends and spending time with their families. Sampdoria supporters received the same hospitality in Marseille, where they were treated as guests of the group rather than ordinary visiting fans.
One frequently retold story concerns a group of Marseille ultras who arrived late for the Derby della Lanterna without tickets. When their Sampdoria friends learned that they were outside the stadium, a large number reportedly left their section to help them enter. Whether repeated through interviews or personal memories, such episodes explain why the relationship came to be understood as a brotherhood rather than a ceremonial twinning.
By the early 1990s, visits between the groups had become more organised. Coach journeys replaced some of the smaller trips made by car, while the colours and banners of each group began appearing more regularly in the other’s stadium. These public symbols allowed the wider supporter scenes in Genoa and Marseille to recognise a relationship that had already become deeply personal. A significant moment came on 31 October 1993, when an Ultras Marseille banner appeared in the Gradinata Sud for Sampdoria’s match against Milan. Sampdoria won 3-2, five months after Marseille had defeated the same opponents in the European Cup final in Munich. Later accounts occasionally placed the two events only days apart, but the appearance of the Marseille banner remains an important early symbol of the friendship.
Throughout the late 1990s and early 2000s, reciprocal visits became familiar. CU84 material appeared at Sampdoria fixtures, while UTC delegations travelled to the Vélodrome and accompanied Marseille supporters on important occasions. The relationship was maintained through anniversaries, away trips, supporter tournaments and gatherings away from the stadium. Members also organised football matches between the two groups. One was held in Genoa near the end of the 1999-2000 season, while another followed in Marseille in February 2001. The gatherings concluded with shared meals and celebrations, reinforcing connections between individuals who had come to know one another over many years.
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| Foto: Ultras Avanti |
The Celebration of 2013
The friendship received its most visible public celebration on 3 August 2013, when Sampdoria hosted Olympique de Marseille in the first Trofeo Riccardo Garrone. By that point, twenty-six years had passed since the initial meeting at the Ferraris. The occasion transformed an otherwise pre-season fixture into a major gathering of supporters from the two cities. Before the match, Sampdoria groups welcomed the Marseille delegation at the Giardini Luzzati in central Genoa. Food, music and drinks were followed by a procession towards the stadium, with the banners of Ultras Tito and Commando Ultra carried through the streets. The event demonstrated that the relationship existed beyond the ninety minutes played on the pitch.
Marseille’s players warmed up in special shirts marking the bond between the groups. Inside the stadium, banners celebrated a friendship without borders, while the two sets of supporters exchanged chants and displays. Sampdoria eventually won an entertaining match 4-3 in front of 14,606 paying spectators, but the result was secondary to the scenes surrounding the occasion. The 2013 gathering was also important because it brought different generations together. Some participants had been present during the first journeys of the 1980s, while younger members were experiencing the relationship directly for the first time. This transfer of personal connections from one generation to another helped the friendship survive changes within both supporter scenes.
Shared Losses and Difficult Moments
The bond was not maintained only through celebrations. Messages of solidarity were exchanged during stadium bans, legal difficulties, personal tragedies and periods of crisis affecting either city. For the members involved, a telephone call or a visit during a difficult moment often carried more meaning than a banner displayed at a high-profile match. Christine Valette was one of the Marseille figures most closely associated with maintaining the connection. Involved with CU84 from its early years, she travelled repeatedly to Genoa and helped turn the original contact into a lasting network of friendships. Following her death in December 2015, tributes from Genoa underlined how deeply she was respected among Sampdoria supporters. The collapse of the Morandi Bridge in Genoa in August 2018 was also felt personally in Marseille. Years of visits meant that the French ultras were not responding to a distant tragedy, but to events affecting a city in which many of them had close friends. The reaction again showed how far the relationship had moved beyond occasional meetings at football matches.
Thirty Years of Friendship
On 11 November 2017, Ultras Tito and Commando Ultra 84 celebrated the thirtieth anniversary of their friendship near the Luigi Ferraris stadium. The programme included photographs, discussions, food and music, creating an opportunity to revisit three decades of journeys between Genoa and Marseille. Members of different generations attended, including younger Marseille supporters entrusted with carrying the relationship forward. The anniversary represented more than the survival of two group names. During those thirty years, both terraces had experienced generational changes, restrictions, stadium bans and wider transformations within European football. Maintaining personal contact across those changes required repeated effort from individuals on both sides. Public evidence of organised exchanges has become less frequent in more recent years, and the present formal status of the twinning is not documented as clearly as it was during the major celebrations of 2013 and 2017. It would therefore be inaccurate to present it as an alliance involving every section of the Sampdoria and Marseille support. The most precise description is that of a historic and deeply rooted friendship between Ultras Tito Cucchiaroni and Commando Ultra 84, supported by personal connections formed over several generations.
A Relationship That Helped Shape CU84
The importance of this friendship cannot be measured only by the number of banners exchanged or matches attended. For CU84, the early journeys to Genoa provided direct access to an established Italian ultras culture at a time when the French movement was still developing. Lessons learned in the Gradinata Sud contributed to the organisation, visual identity and mentality that the Marseille group later developed at the Vélodrome. For Ultras Tito, the relationship demonstrated that their influence had travelled beyond Italy without requiring either group to abandon its identity. Genoa remained blucerchiata and Marseille remained blue and white, but the groups discovered common values in loyalty, hospitality, independence and collective support. What began on 4 January 1987 was neither a club initiative nor a carefully planned partnership. It grew from journeys made by supporters who wanted to learn, followed by friendships strong enough to continue away from the stadium. That human foundation is what made the connection between Ultras Tito and Commando Ultra 84 one of the most remarkable international relationships in European ultras culture.