ROME (ITALPRESS) – “Ours was a hard-fought Olympics: we beat the French in the mixed team, we gave the Koreans a hard time but we couldn’t achieve what we had prepared for. It’s not nice to say we didn’t make it, but I have to thank the boys for the effort they put in and for everything they did previously.” This was said by the president of the Italian Archery Federation, Mario Scarzella, during an interview at the Rome headquarters of Italpress. The Italian team failed to win a medal at the Paris Olympics, “It was particular, a moment when the opponents were stronger than us,” the Fitarco number one stressed, “We will try again, they will try again. All this, however, does not mean that I am not satisfied with the behavior of the boys, on the contrary.” Great satisfaction instead for the Paralympics, where the Italians managed to win three medals, one gold in the mixed event and two bronze: “Here too we met very strong opponents, but our boys showed their very high value and perhaps they deserved a little more because two fourth places burn a little but highlight the validity of our athletes. We made a parallel structure to the Olympic one and we used it for the Paralympic world and this gave us the possibility to make our boys grow little by little. It’s been a lifetime since we’ve stepped off the podium at the Paralympics.” The historic president of Fitarco, who has been in office for twenty-four years, also announced that he would not run again in view of the elections next February 16: “I have been a federal president for twenty-four years, the boys and girls have given us great satisfaction, in these years we have collaborated with the whole Italian archery world with excellent expectations for the future, and I think someone else should carry on this discourse.” Final coda with thanks: “I just have to say thank you to the boys, the coaches, the Vice Presidents who have stood by me, the federal advisors, the Presidents of the Regional Committees and Societies who dedicate time to our sport, often taking it away from their families, the staff and all those who have collaborated to make the honor of Fitarco high. I will not leave the sporting world, this I can guarantee, I will remain within the Federal Council, as world vice president and European president. But it is also right that someone else should feel what I felt twenty-four years ago,” Scarzella concluded.- photo Italpress -(ITALPRESS).
