“I have never lacked peace for Atlanta ’96. I have never had an obsession for the Olympic gold, I am not like Baggio who always thinks back to the penalty of USA 94…. Ours was an extraordinary team that lost the gold by two balls, this time we won by a landslide”. Julio Velasco raises the best of balls to his Italian Olympic champions after the 3-0 against the United States. And then Myriam Sylla, Anna Danese, Paola Egonu, Monica De Gennaro, Sarah Fahr, Caterina Bosetti, Ekaterina Andropova, Marina Lubian, Carlotta Cambi, Loveth Omoruyi, Ilaria Spirito, Gaia Giovannini become his new generation of phenomena, or rather phenomena. And so Lorenzo Bernardi, Vigor Bovolenta, Marco Bracci, Luca Cantagalli, Ferdinando De Giorgi, Andrea Gardini, Andrea Giani, Andrea Lucchetta, Marco Meoni, Andrea Sartoretti, Paolo Tofoli, Fabio Vullo, Andrea Zorzi remain in legend but leave the way in joy to an Italian team that today writes one of the most beautiful pages of volleyball ever. Not the past, but the present. Velasco, who inherited this team after Davide Mazzanti’s farewell only in October of last year, forged it in his own way, created a group and went to take that Olympic gold that he had always chased, that had always eluded him. And not just him. At his side Lorenzo Bernardi, one of his own, one of that generation that between 1989 and 1996, was able to win the world championship, world league, European championship, world super challenge and everything you could aspire to. Dominating. Everything, anything, except the Olympics. In Barcelona in 1992 out against Holland 3-2 in the quarterfinals, in Atlanta in 1996, defeated in the final, always with Holland, still 3-2, as favourites. After winning seven out of seven matches, leaving only two sets on the road. A real curse that today, even if we don’t want to say it, and perhaps it’s right that we don’t say it, has been dispelled. “Volleyball and journalism must stop talking about the missing gold, it’s harmful for everyone – Velasco had said a few days ago – Let’s enjoy this, what we have and not what we don’t have, the Olympic gold will arrive when it arrives…”. He was a good prophet: the Olympic gold has arrived.