An inexhaustible well of champions who made the fortune of Italian sport before and immediately after the war. Footballers, boxers, tennis players, athletes… There are many – impossible to list them all – Rijeka players who have contributed to the successes of the Azzurri, winning Olympic, world and European titles as well as obtaining results of absolute prestige in other international events.

In the collective imagination, Ezio Loik was perhaps the best exponent of Fiume football [see opening photo, Ed.]. A struggling midfielder, with a rather stocky physique and a not very elegant bearing, he was nicknamed “elephant”. One of the pillars of the Grande Torino, he died in the Superga tragedy on 4 May 1949. The space between Loik and Rodolfo Volk, known as “Sciabbolone”, is short. He was the first great bomber in the history of Roma, with 103 goals in 157 league games. His motto, as the chronicles recall
of the time, was "I don't think, I shoot". Two other illustrious exponents of Fiume football were the Varglien brothers. Mario, known as Varglien I, spent 14 seasons in Juventus, winning five championships (those of the so-called Golden Five-Year Period) and two Italian Cups. He also became world champion, without playing, in 1934 with Pozzo's Italy. Giovanni, known as Nini or Varglien II, played his debut match in Serie A in the first single-round championship, that of the 1929-30 season. Having established himself in the years to come, he too was capable of winning five consecutive championships.

Not just football, they said. Boxer Ulderico Sergo hit the headlines in 1936, when he won the gold medal in the bantamweight division at the Berlin Olympics, beating American Jackie Wilson on points.

Today, Italian tennis, after several years of disappointment, is experiencing a magical moment with two players in the top ten. In the past, it was two athletes from Rijeka who took up the racket. Gianni Cucelli was a player of great quality and temperament, a fighter: his successes would have been more numerous without the drama of the war. He won the Italian championship several times in singles and doubles, asserting himself at Roland Garros, Wimbledon and the US Open (semifinalist in 1949 with Marcello Del Bello). It is said that Cucelli was one of the first, if not the first, to wear shorts. The one who won a Slam title was another great exponent of Rijeka tennis, Orlando Sirola, who in 1959 triumphed in Paris together with Nicola Pietrangeli.

We close this brief overview with Abdon Pamich. The race walker, after winning bronze at the 1960 Games in Rome, won gold in the 50 km in Tokyo four years later. The episode in which he was the protagonist remains memorable from that race: because of a cold tea, Pamich had an intestinal crisis: "To have a minimum of privacy there was a station at km 35, too far away... I took care of it covered by some security personnel", he said.

Alexander Superina
Source: The Voice of the People – 25/11/2021