Sunderland’s fantastic supporters in Italy are gearing up for a Mackem invasion - and they can’t wait to put on a party for you all.

The members of the Black Cats of Italy have been busy organising a wonderful welcome for the thousands of Black Cats fans who will arrive next month for the game against AC Milan.

The match is planned for Thursday, December 10, at the San Siro stadium but there’s a huge pre-match welcome on the way from 11am.

Gianmarco Fermi said: “In addition to us Italians, members from other European branches will be joining us!! We know of people coming from Finland, Estonia, Australia, Spain, Ireland, Canada, Bulgaria, Slovakia, the Netherlands, and elsewhere… We chose that section specifically so we could all be together… it’s going to be fantastic!!!

“On top of that, we’ve heard that 10,000 to 15,000 people will be traveling from Sunderland, so we’ve teamed up with a professional event agency to set up a Fan Zone.

“It will feature big screens for the match, music, drinks, accessible facilities for people with disabilities, and much more.”

“We’re just waiting for the tickets to be released on the “Ticketone” portal, priced at €15 (renting the venue was, unfortunately, extremely expensive). We also want to emphasize that we, as a branch, aren’t making any profit from this. Everything is being handled by the agency. We Italians are thrilled and really hope everything goes perfectly.”

“We’re all very excited about the upcoming match against Milan… when Milan came up in the draw, we were celebrating here in Italy too.”

Gianmarco and his brother Matteo are from Lumezzane in Brescia, and have followed SAFC ever since they took the Black Cats to Europe on the Football Manager game in 2007/2008.

Even though the brothers have followed Sunderland for 19 years, they had never visited Wearside until April 2024 - and it didn’t disappoint.

Gianmarco told the Echo at the time: “We had tears in our eyes. An indescribable emotion.”

The Stadium of Light was ‘beautiful’ and the brothers praised the people of Sunderland for their ‘amazing kindness and availability’. Their visit to Wearside included a trip to the Fans Museum, a walk on Roker beach and getting to meet Sunderland ex-footballer Lee Cattermole.

Now the twin brothers are getting ready to experience more memorable scenes with Sunderland and you can find out more about the plans at https://www.facebook.com/blackcatsofitaly/?locale=en_GB