Martinenghi yellow: first disqualified, then readmitted. Controversy erupts
The semifinal of the 100 breaststroke at the World Swimming Championships in Singapore brings with it a controversial tail that concerns one of the Italian champions, Nicolò Martinenghi. “Tete” who came first at the end of the qualifying race for the final, had in fact not even had time to rejoice, seeing his name removed from the list of finalists, only to be readmitted a few minutes later.
Immediately after the announcement of the disqualification, controversy had erupted among fans, especially on social media, as apparently none of the images of the competition seemed to guistify the decision to disqualify the Italian champion. Shortly after, however, the sigh of relief: Martinenghi’s name reappeared among those participating in the final, where among others there’s also another Italian, Ludovico Viberti.
Martinenghi, Olympic champion in the discipline, finished his own semifinal with a time of 58.62, the second best time after Chinese Qin Haiyang’s 58.24. Approximately ten minutes elapsed between the disqualification and the rectification of the result, during which the many Italian fans held their breath, wondering what the irregularity initially detected by the competition judges might have been. Eventually the explanation came: an alleged dolphin gambit, later determined to be regulation by the judges themselves.
The lifting of the disqualification thus guarantees the presence of two Italian nationals, Martinenghi and Viberti, in the 100 breaststroke final. In addition to them and China’s Qin, also competing for medals are Germany’s Lucas Matzerath, USA’s Joshua Matheny, Netherlands’Caspar Corbeau, Kyrgyz Denis Petrashov, and Russians Kirill Prigoda and Danil Semianinov.
