Daniele De Rossi insisted he had not yearned for these moments. Interviewed by Dazn before Saturday’s Rome derby, he gave us a glimpse of vulnerability he might not have allowed in his playing days. “No, this little bit of anxiety you have beforehand, I really didn’t miss that,” he said candidly. “But that’s the beauty of our sport and our city.” More than 20 years have passed since De Rossi took part in this derby for the first time, coming off the bench in a 2-0 win for Roma. He played 30 more, and it is easy to see why some nervousness may persist. De Rossi endured some of the lowest moments of his career against Lazio, including a red card for punching Stefano Mauri in 2012 and defeat in this fixture’s only-ever major cup final at the end of the same season. There were plenty of highs too, not least a Roma victory during his first derby wearing the captain’s armband in 2010. De Rossi won more than he lost. And though he might not have missed the stresses of participating, he still had his wife, Sarah Felberbaum, disguise him with makeup so he could sneak into the Stadio Olimpico’s Curva Sud and take in the spectacle as a fan in the year he retired. “I’m fortunate to have played in the two most beautiful derbies in the world,” continued De Rossi, referencing his end-of-career chapter with Boca Juniors and their Superclásico with River Plate. “I do feel privileged to live this one now from a different perspective.” As a player, De Rossi could let emotions get the better of him. Claudio Ranieri famously took both him and Francesco Totti off at half-time of a crucial derby that Roma were losing while chasing a Scudetto in April 2010 after concluding that both were at risk of letting the occasion overwhelm them. The Giallorossi came from behind in the second half to win. De Rossi has expressed his admiration for Ranieri, a man from whom “you leave every conversation feeling enriched”. A fellow Roman who also grew up supporting the club, the now-Cagliari manager offered a model for how to keep one’s cool on such occasions. When Gianluca Mancini headed Roma in front just before half-time on Saturday, De Rossi limited his celebration to a gentle shake of the fists. Every derby has its own story. This one felt like the start of a new series within an anthology: same setting, familiar faces, but fresh leads – with De Rossi and Igor Tudor taking on the manager roles. For three years these games had been shaped by personalities of their predecessors: José Mourinho and Maurizio Sarri. They arrived in the same summer: the Portuguese first and the Italian second, as though Lazio felt compelled to respond to their neighbours’ headline-grabbing appointment with one of their own. The dynamic was captured in the mural that appeared in the city of Mourinho riding in on a Vespa, only to be overlaid by another of Sarri blowing smoke in his face. Roma won the Conference League and reached the Europa League final a year later, but Lazio dominated them domestically, finishing second in Serie A last season. Mourinho’s derby record showed one win, one draw, and four defeats. Not coincidentally, he was fired six days after a Coppa Italia loss to Lazio in January. The team De Rossi inherited was ninth in Serie A and had collected five points from its last six league games. It claimed 23 from the next 10 – losing only to league leaders Inter – and had already risen to fifth before Saturday’s derby. Lazio, at the same time, were slipping backward, Sarri venting his frustration at his club’s transfer strategy before resigning last month after a run of five defeats in six games. Tudor replaced him and got off to a flying start with a league win over Juventus, though Lazio were defeated by the same opponents in the cup three days later. Saturday’s derby was their third game in a week and perhaps – as the manager would later lament – simply one too many. Roma were good value for the half-time lead that Mancini’s goal provided. Where Mourinho’s teams could appear rigid and over-cautious, De Rossi has encouraged players to trust their instincts and break lines. Lorenzo Pellegrini, the captain, has spoken of feeling free in a way that he had not done for the last year-and-a-half under Mourinho, and he dovetailed effectively with Paulo Dybala and Zeki Çelik on the right-hand side. Leandro Paredes, a former teammate of De Rossi at Roma, is another player whose performances have improved noticeably since the switch, and he showed welcome composure here amidst a midfield melee. If Stephan El Shaarawy had fired on target after being played through by Romelu Lukaku at the start of the second half Roma might have enjoyed a calm cruise to victory. Instead, his shot came back off the post and a hot-tempered game remained on a knife’s edge. Daichi Kamada put the ball in the net for Lazio but the goal was disallowed for offside. Moments later, Matteo Guendouzi got into an altercation with Paulo Dybala, who reached into his sock and whipped out a shinpad with what appeared to be a picture of himself kissing the World Cup on it. Guendouzi had been on the bench for France’s defeat in the 2022 final. Pellegrini was lucky only to get a yellow card after scything through Guendouzi and Felipe Anderson seconds apart at the end of the game. Even De Rossi allowed his outward calm to slip as he roared and leapt into the arms of a colleague at full-time. He joined his players celebrating under the Curva, though he claimed they had pressured him into it. “When you win the derby you have to make a bit of cinema,” he added. “I said when I won my first derby as a player that I was the happiest man in the world. I think maybe today my dad is the happiest man in the world. At home, under a blanket, though. He can’t watch the derby at the stadium.” Some of the celebrations might have crossed a line. Mancini, so deliriously happy that he threw his shorts into the crowd, faces a possible suspension after borrowing a flag from the Curva depicting a rat on a backdrop of Lazio colours. De Rossi cannot condone those actions but will understand better than most how the emotions of this fixture hit differently for his team. Hired on a caretaker basis to steer Roma through to the end of this season, his unique relationship with this club – a childhood fan and academy graduate who grew up as “Capitan Futuro” (Future Captain) and eventually did earn the armband – have always given him an obvious appeal. Yet De Rossi wants to prove that he is more than those things. “I don’t want to be coddled,” he said on Saturday. “I want to be treated as real manager.” He is making a strong case for Roma to do so. They ended the weekend still fifth – a position that looks likely to qualify for the Champions League, which the club has not reached since 2019 – and are sit just three points behind fourth-placed Bologna . Returning to Europe’s top club competition has been a primary objective for Roma’s American owners from day one. It is hard to imagine a scenario in which achieving it would not earn De Rossi a contract extension, and more derby days to come.