In the era of communication seamlessly, what is not told does not exist, close in a continuous narrative that should be organic and consistent, of ourselves first of all of what surrounds us. It applies to everything, even more so, for the stories of sport, where in the rudders of the sports newspapers of the past there was football, engines, basketball and, finally, the ‘minor’ sports – never journalistic expression was more unhappy – which have become, rightly, Olympic over time.

The great successes

Words are important, he played a famous film, and they are even more so when we use them is journalists who, for profession, consistency and competence, we should not be wrong or use them at random, yet. In journalism, according to what has been taught, one thing should always win on everything: the news. The news breaks the competition, upsets and first pages, forces to reprint newspapers – perhaps it is better to say forced – or to update sites, as well as to correct posts on social media. But in Italian sporting journalism this golden rule of the trade does not seem to take root. An example? In this last month we attended the Exploit of the women’s national football team, which touched the European final, in an unfortunate semifinal ‘unfortunate’ against England.

To the girls of volleyball who won the Nations League with Velasco, after the gold of Paris last year, rowing 29 consecutive victories, a world record that erte them in the role of invincible. In men’s volleyball we continue to be one of the strongest teams. In youth basketball we win with low hands. In fencing we continue to win, as usual. In swimming, then, the Singapore World Cup gave us incredible exploits, exploit that have the face of Gregorio Paltrinieri, Geneva Taddeucci, Chiara Pellacani, Nicolò Martinenghi, Thomas Ceccon, Simona Quadarella, Benedetta Pilato and Simone Cerasuolo, among others and the others. There, where Gregorio Paltrinieri and Simona Quadarella if they had won the same trophies in football would have monuments everywhere, instead they struggle to conquer, with their extraordinary successes, the first pages of the newspapers, in particular the sports ones, successes repeated over time, crossing generations of enthusiasts and swimmers. On the one hand the traditional media respond that it is put on the front page, on the cover, the one that makes ‘sell’, on the other hand and practitioners claim a necessary visibility, comparing what happens abroad.

Swimming and fencing

The team, for example, often opens with swimming, fencing, athletics, handball, etc., celebrating every success as a piece of national identity. The Guardian carefully follows the evolution of English women’s football, he sent dedicated, weekly sections, comments. We talk to us of “filling the contents”, and everything is thrown into the cauldron: with the world champion of Cerasuolo which is worth less than a friendly summer of the usual notes. It will be trivial, also the theme, but we are always stopped here, a mirror of a country and a sporty inculture where women’s football is too often – ignominously – endured and second generation Italians who win proudly bringing the blue colors must waste time responding to racists and blocking haters on social media. And here you have to decide: what role does sports journalism have? That of making the movement grow, that of giving voice to the new champions and new champions, telling their successes and their stories, or that of making the reflection of a part of the country’s belly: the most retrum, the most misogynist and the most anti -system (divisive); For fear, or with the excuse, to lose readers and playing on social controversies, transforming the gold of Cerasuolo, always him, into a Pro Allegri and Juventus speck, for those who cheer a sportsman according to his football cheering, who a sadness, “pessimism and annoyance” recited an old comic claim.

In Italy practicing and swimming members are 3,480,000, who tell us that sacrificing a first page for the transfer market – the place of the post truth par excellence of sports journalism – or for the summer friendlies instead of the historic world championship medals of the first is, at least, a nonsense, without mentioning the Fantozzi of the battleship Potemkin. Tennis currently, with its 4.5 million, has more football practitioners, but only the two consecutive Davis cups and a Sinner, whose phenomenon we have already widely told on these columns, number one in the world have broken the crystal roof of the front pages of Italian sports newspapers. Sports that also brings sponsors and, therefore, advertising of prestigious and particularly remunerative brands, both for tennis players and for the media. But so sports journalism risks transforming itself into the most pushed marketing raisin of the resonance, abdicating the role of knowing how to tell the most winning, more important, less planned stories, but also more curious and hidden than sport; Without forgetting inclusiveness, investigations and painful but edifying defeats.

A new generation of fans

The Italian sorting journalism, from the late sixties onwards, has contributed to the growth of the football movement respecting itself and now there are millions of fans who claim the same visibility, the same attention and the same respect for the Olympic sports that give us great satisfactions and indescribable emotions, where, sometimes, it is difficult to see them live on television. And then, where the press slows down, the personal channels accelerate. Reel, podcasts, videos on Tiktok of athletes and athletes become alternative chronicle, voiceover. A new generation of fans and enthusiasts no longer reads the morning sports newspaper, but follows the direct Instagram after the race, comments the emotions, enters the virtual changing rooms where the real part of the sport breathes. Italy triumphs where the spotlights do not arrive. Swimming, women’s volleyball, girls’ football, etc. And the big newspapers remain clinging to men’s football, which no longer wins. While those who deserve are celebrated abroad, we need the push of social networks to get out of the shade. It is not just an editorial problem. It is a cultural reflection. Italy is still crushed by an idea of old, hierarchical, male chauvinist sport. Sport ‘true’ is men’s football. The rest is passion from lovers, interest from specialists, enthusiasm from converted. And so who wins, if he does not have the right jersey or the right contract, ends on the margins. And whoever loses, if he is in the ‘right’ context, is still the news of the day. Still, it would be enough to look around.

A country in turmoil

The numbers of the Coni tell a sporting country in turmoil: more members in team sports other than football, more women, younger, more practicing. But the mirror that should reflect this reality – the media system – is crackled, demanded, a prisoner of a past that no longer exists. Every summer Italy wins something important, in sports considered ‘minor’ only by those who do not look at them or do not have enough competence to tell them. Every summer the first pages tell more. And every summer the distance between those who make sports and those who tell it grows. Today there is no longer a title to enter the public conversation: you need a 30 -second clip well done. A message in which you recognize ourselves. A credible face. In this, the Italian athletes who struggle to put on the front page, have already put themselves on the cover alone. They are ‘first’ in another way. And very often, they are there because I really deserved it. While the team opens the first page with the triumphs of French athletes in swimming or judo, and while the Guardian has a fixed column for athletics and cricket, the main Italian sports newspapers still seem prisoners of the twentieth century. Men’s football occupies 80% of the space, even when it does not win.

Formula 1 – in black crisis with a Ferrari unable to worry Red Bull and McLaren – continues to have nine columns titles. Cycling, with a ganna often forced to run abroad for lack of internal vision, remains clinging to the memories of Pantani and Nibali. Those who today bring medals and concrete results, however, remain in the second row. The rhetoric of “Italian pride” is activated only to ongoing Olympic games, and then turned off with the same speed with which the flags from the balconies are removed. The problem is not only journalistic, but cultural. In a country where sports narration has been colonized by bar commentators and by the “fan on TV” format, the space for quality and for competence has been drastically reduced. Sport has become entertainment before I tell. And if swimming, volleyball, rugby or basketball do not click, then they don’t make news. Yet the data are clear: Olympic sports collect young members, record records records during large events and create authentic communities. The problem is that they do not sell subscriptions to pay TV, they do not feed gossip, they do not generate scandals. And therefore, to the mainstream media, they are not interested.

So, while you are struggling to look for the next “New Del Piero” or to understand if Leclerc will overtake Verstappen by Christmas, the sporting Italy changes skin. It is becoming a multifaceted nation, where excellence emerges outside the football stadiums. But someone is needed that this story tells it. Which turns on the spotlight on team companies and ‘not expected’ medals. Who puts competence on the front page, not the controversy. Italy wins, but often nobody tells it. I triumph away from the spotlight, while the spotlights insist on an empty stage. It is time for sports journalism to return to make their job: do not indulge the habit, but anticipate the gaze. Do not pursue consent, but to train culture.