A Marquis in Rio – August 12, 2016

A Marquis in Rio. This is the Olympic column of analysis, sports, entertainment, costume and a bit of spice that Sportal.it offers for the Olympic Games from August 5 to 21. The guest is Cino Marchese, a multi-faceted and unique sports personality: expertise, technical knowledge, passion, international experience, organizational successes, marketing and communications manager. And also solid personal friendships with great champions.

He began his career as a sports manager directing the Italian office of Mark Mc Cormack’s IMG for about 20 years. Later a consultant and advisor to many companies and organizations operating in sports, today active mainly in sports facilities. He has followed many sports personalities such as Alberto Tomba, Paolo Rossi, Roberto Baggio, Deborah Compagnoni, Martina Navratilova, Monika Seles and many other great champions. He collaborates with several university facilities and lectures in several multilingual master’s training.

– Phelps won his fourth gold medal in Rio, 22 total with the 200 medley; he has the 100 butterfly left today and the4x100 mixed on Saturday:
Retired after London, he had been on a drinking binge, no doubt better the water…of this phenomenon is more important his physique, or the team that manages him.

“About Phelps we have already said far and wide, and by now he only amazes when he doesn’t win. This is a true phenomenon in the history of sports and not just swimming. I think it is more due to some extraordinary qualities of his physique, but it is clear that he is well managed.”

– The Baltimore champion has found balance in marriage and the birth of a child, will it be the same for Fabio Fognini who had no less than Andy Murray in his grasp by being eliminated after a torturous race?”

“I want to hope that Fabio will also find those balances that he has so far amply demonstrated he does not have. Let’s go easy, though, with comparisons to Phelps. Fabio is a very good guy, nice and outgoing and he is a very good player, but not a superstar because to be one you also have to know how to manage your emotions and the moments of difficulty that come when you least expect it. Yesterday, for example, he was very good at managing his opponent’s frenzies, but on the most beautiful when it was necessary to manage his own, he literally walked off the court.”

– Let’s try to analyze what are the criticalities of “The Sewer,” will it be possible to eliminate them and how?.

“I have known Fabio since he started playing. I know very well his father Fulvio and his manager, who is from the beginning Andrea Gaudenzi, my former client and son of my friends. Andrea knows the problem perfectly well and with experience and ability has tried to correct certain attitudes of his and has confessed to me more than once that he has never achieved anything. His coach , Jose Perlas, is one of the best around and he too has tried to change certain negative aspects of Fabio, but he too has failed. Therefore let us keep Fognini as he is and hope that his wife Flavia will be able to achieve those results that others have not been able to. One thing is for sure Flavia will try.”

– Wasn’t it a good idea to do the doubles-mixed with his wife Flavia Penetta, his Federation tried?”

“I don’t think it would have been a good idea. Do you want to jeopardize their marriage right away?”

– What if Binaghi put Pennetta in Barazzutti’s place?

“I don’t care what Binaghi does. I also don’t think Flavia aspires to that position. The situation then of young people in Italian tennis is not at all encouraging and given now the imminent retirements of Vinci and Schiavone, the breakup with Giorgi and the wear and tear of Errani and Knapp, we can only see black clouds on the horizon.”

– Simone Biles 19-year-old from Texas with her 145 centimeters is the black queen of gymnastics, if she were not a concentrate of muscles she might look like an elf with magical gifts. She arouses sympathy, who would have thought that one day gymnastics would be dominated by Americans and find its high point in a ‘black performer, a propaganda result of immense significance? And hasn’t the time come by now that happened in swimming as well?

“Biles was not born out of nowhere and wise planning has been done in the past. She was forged by Marta and Bela Karoly legendary Hungarian-Romanian gymnastics couple who produced 9 Olympic champions. Blacks are known to be formidable athletes and in my opinion still have tremendous room for growth. In swimming overcome all those fables related to the bad buoyancy of their race, it seems to me that I have seen some movement in this regard.”

– Here comes athletics, without Tamberi it’s raining wet, why have we gone so low?”

“Tamberi would not have been the solution to all the ills of athletics. The problem lies, in my opinion, in propaganda and initiation of sports in schools. If swimming somehow solved this problem, athletics did not even touch it. Everything has been left to chance and the crisis of Military Sports Groups, globalization that has pushed to “buy” athletes already made and a lot of sports ignorance have closed the circle and we find ourselves with a dramatic situation with no way out.”

– Even Italian boxing is no longer what it used to be, no new names have popped up and Clemente Russo has played for four years to exploit his character instead of equipping himself with a stone fist and beaten by a Russian in Rio he blamed the referees.

“Boxing is in crisis all over the world because to stand in a ring and take a beating is not an attractive prospect so in my opinion it will be worse and worse not only in Italy, but all over the world. Clemente Russo tried to capitalize on nothing and since it was not possible he took it out on the referees, a typical boorish attitude inherited from soccer.”

– The Setterosa also beat Australia, between water polo and volleyball will a women’s team medal come?”

“Setterosa and men’s volleyball certainly have a good chance. The Setterosa girls really impressed me with determination and grit.”

– Where did Magnini ever go after his black day and the disappointment of his beloved? A photo has appeared on Instagram in which he kisses her (on the cheek) with this beautiful phrase “You are unique!” but it is a shot from the opening day of the Games, there is media attention on this couple as there is for the scions of the British royal family and silence does not like.

“Undoubtedly for Magnini it is a very sad Olympics. He in the twilight of old age, his beloved at the peak of disappointment and doubt about retirement. Combining these feelings I do not think is easy. For the most beautiful couple in the world to deal with no longer being the center of attention, I’m not saying it’s a tragedy, but it’s a new situation and you have to be able to adapt.”

– Golf has returned to the Olympics after 112 years with many defections, the tournament is not worth perhaps one of the top 20 of the two major tours, the best Americans are “only Watson and Fowler” already off to a bad start, more qualified instead the European participation with Stenson, Garcia, Rose and Kaymer, for the Italians Manassero, repechaged for the waiver of Francesco Molinari, 11th in the first round, the other Italian is Nino Bertasio.

“Golf matches tennis. It is a minor tournament and one that is not in the priorities of the best players. Maybe with time things can change, but to expect everything and right away was unrealistic. Manassero, decent, but more is needed for his revival, which is not impossible.”

– What happened to Matteo Manassero, very young he won in England the biggest tournament on the European calendar after the Open, became No. 1 in the rankings and then disappeared.

“On his debut he aroused enthusiasm and expectations out of the ordinary. These facts created anxiety and a lot of nervousness for him. Matthew is managed by IMG, the best, and his manager Guy Kinnings has my highest esteem so he has every chance to bounce back. However, we need to be patient and not use athletes for ulterior motives.”

-Despite his flaunted reformism, for sports Renzi has aligned himself with his predecessors and is continuing with a 1942 law that recognizes CONI’s delegation of management of Italian sports; does his firsthand presence at the Games perhaps have the significance of an exploration to realize what is needed to get out of an anomaly that has now shifted too far toward professionalism?

“Renzi has understood nothing about sport and makes mistakes time and again. I have always been in his favor, today a little less so, and at the time I went to Florence to get a message to him that if his desire to scrap traditional politics was not only legitimate, but necessary, for sport it was even more necessary to scrap the system that governed it. If he now realized that it is time for a change and opted for a different CONI and Ministry of Sport certainly Malagò would be the most credible candidate, but it is necessary to change gears and get rid of the bureaucrats.”

– Recently during an assembly at the Senate Michelino Davigo, former undersecretary of the Interior and sportman, relaunched the proposal for a Ministry of Sports saying that CONI should only deal with Olympic activity, image participation, and no longer the management of sports being the grassroots sports completely supported by families, youth sports neglected and abandoned and it is up to the state the task the territorial redistribution of facilities and economic resources, prevention, facilities, school.

“I don’t believe in parliamentary skirmishes. They always boil down to a clash between opposing factions. In this case it is necessary to get everyone in agreement and try to introduce concepts that are in everyone’s interest. However, it is necessary for there to be harmony and constructiveness, which today we do not know what that is.”

– Between Renzi and Malagò a strong partnership has been born: is it a marriage of interests or could Giovanni be this Minister of Sport, especially if the Rome 2024 operation goes through?”

“The two liked each other from the first moment. However, I don’t know how much harmony there really is. Undoubtedly it suits both of them to be friends. We have to see when some critical issues arise what happens. Yes I have already said it Malagò: he can be a good Minister of Sports.”

– Let’s talk about the journalistic support to the races, compared to the best world broadcasters what is the quality Ra? What is the level of commentators and analysts, are there any pleasant surprises among them or champions or personalities of the environment?.

“RAI in my opinion does a bad job. It doesn’t give information, it doesn’t suggest this or that race. You have to go to the ventura with the remote control. The commentators are often out of place and the analysts as well. I liked Igor Cassina and Luca Sacchi is correct. The newscasts are poorly done and poorly conducted, and above all they do not give the information that the viewer needs.”

– Why does Rai follow the basketball tournament very little, which is also by far the one of the highest level among team sports?

“It does not follow basketball because there is no Italy and because it has no basketball culture.”

– By the way, Australia proved to be a tough nut to crack for the ersatz Dream Team below at halftime and failed to exceed 100 points for the first time.

“Australia is not a surprise. It has excellent players on the rosters and they all have NBA experience. The U.S. is a very good team and they are not a surrogate.”

– With his team in the guano took care of it with 9 out of 15 bombs and 31 points Carmelo Anthony, the USA national team’s all-time top scorer and the first to win 3 gold if all goes smoothly for “Coach K’s” lineup. A controversial character, Superbone, as I call “Melo,” is the Knicks star who regularly hasn’t made the playoffs since the days when New York sacrificed Gallinari believing he could win the title.

“Obviously it’s a team with little chemistry that even a master like “Coach K” struggles to assemble, it will be better and better, however, and will win hands down.”

– The first sure qualifier in Group B is Lithuania having overthrown (51 rebounds vs. 29!) 2004 Athens winner Argentina with a trio of guys who don’t make it to 70, namely Valanciunas, Sabonis and Kuzminskas the top scorer of the game with 23 points.

“Lithuania is the real surprise. Its youngsters are formidable and the old guys are integrating well. The Argentines are frustrated by now.”

– As it was meant to be, won the preolimipic in Turin Croatia beat Spain also won on the night with Brazil and if it liquidates modest Nigeria is among the top four when we could have been there with some humility and character.

“The difference between us and them is right there. Humility and character that we only have in words. Then sport has incontrovertible laws and to everything that happens there is a reason.”

– According to predictions, with two rounds to go in the qualifying rounds, in Group B they risk being out of the top four either Brazil or Spain who in the night beat Nigeria with difficulty: these countries have a total of 19 players in the NBA which shows the weakness of the “Petrucci paradigm” according to which we were the best with 4 NBA players and Messina NBA coach.

“The rules are there and they must be respected even the unfair ones. You don’t go anywhere with proclamations and you only risk making bad figures.”

– FIBA has ex officio admitted the Brazilian national teams to the Olympic tournament, wrong and outdated promotional formula.

“No. I think,even if it is customs of the past, it is right. For promotion and propaganda, it is right that there is the home national team.”

– For the next edition (Tokyo), the winner of the Games of the basketball tournament, as part of a revolution of international activity to launch the 2019 World Cup in China as the flagship event of the planet, will have to qualify during the four-year period, so the NBA will not concede its players, and this also applies to the Italians and the basketball tournament will become like the soccer one.

“These are the rules of professionalism and it is impossible to go against them. The “Decoubertinian” spirit belongs to the past in these cases and the one who pays is always right, after all, this has already happened in soccer so…….”

– The small archipelago of Fiji won rugby sevens gold against the English masters, is the world turning upside down?

“Rugby sevens is a nice and good substitute and therefore it doesn’t count.”

– Medal table: with the bronze medal of the Campania’s “2 Senza” Abbagnale-Di Costanzo, 12 medals, means with 9 days to go to be in 7th place for medals and in Europe behind only Russia (19) and Great Britain (16), uale was the prevision of the eve in newspapers and CONI?.

“It was more or less the forecast. It’s just that in the prediction stage everyone is afraid of being wrong and so they keep themselves buttoned up.”

Edited by ENRICO CAMPANA