Fencing Magni and Sonnessa at the Under 17 World Championships

It is difficult to change a winning team. This is certainly what the Fencing Federation thought when it called up the Italian national team, just announced, for the Cadet and Youth World Championships to be held in Wuxi, China, from 7 to 15 April. The weapons commissioners – Dario Chiadò for the épée – have in fact focused on continuity with the excellent European Youth Championships held less than a month ago in Antalya, Turkey.

Thus the three Romagnoli have been called up again, Francesco Delfino, for the Circolo Ravennate della Spada, and the two standard-bearers of the Circolo Schermistico Forlivese Riccardo Magni and Nicolò Sonnessa, the latter capable of winning the individual silver in the continental event as well as the gold with the team, formed precisely by the three Romagnoli and the Campanian Davide Del Prete. Unfortunately among the Under 17s the three called up will participate only as individuals, because the team event is not scheduled for the Cadets' Spada and thus they will not be able to assert their strength expressed in Turkey, where they have shown that they have very few rivals.

These call-ups are of course a prestigious result for the Circolo Forlivese, which has two representatives out of a total of forty called up, one of the very few clubs to have more than one athlete at the top youth world championship. Therefore, only one day of competition, exactly April 14, the penultimate day of the Wuxi championship, for the two Forlivesi who will take to the platform with the Ravenna native to try to win a world medal as well.

Acting as a mother hen for the young fencers is an exceptional head of delegation, namely Valentina Vezzali, one of the most titled athletes in the history of world fencing.

Ugo Bentivogli