Sensational news: Villa Cortese to merge with Novara

On a grey Sunday afternoon, the destiny of Italian women’s volleyball has changed, with such unexpected and sensational news that you might be forgiven for thinking it was April fool’s day. But we are now in May, and it is all true. MC-Carnaghi Villa Cortese and Asystel Novara have just announced they are merging, in order to realise a new, joint project: a new Asystel MC-Carnaghi team that will play in the next season of the top women’s league. The merger has been decided, with the utmost discretion, by the President of Villa Cortese, Gian Carlo Aliverti, and the manager of Novara, Massimo De Stefano, with the approval of the two “owners”, Flavio Radice and Antonio Caserta. “At this time of economic contraction,” read the short, joint statement by the two clubs, “this synergy will allow two groups of supporters to continue dreaming big. Novara and Villa Cortese have played a leading role in women’s volleyball in the twenty-first century and have written memorable pages in the history of our sport, achieving important successes. We both have an unrealised dream, and, if it is true that united we stand, together we will have more chances to realise it.”

In short, a genuine bolt out of the blue, that leaves volleyball fans agape and which, especially, poses a series of questions. The only certainty is that the new club will be competing at the start of the next Italian championship and in the Champions League. For the rest, obviously, where the team will play (the problems in using its stadium were among the main reasons that, in the last few years, had driven Novara to threaten to abandon the sport) still has to be defined, but so do the objectives and strategies, starting with the trainer (at this point, the name of Pedullà comes to mind), and the players. This move also reopens the matter of enrolments in the next season, given that one of the two teams will not be there, and so will have to be replaced (by Pavia, or by the loser of the A2 league playoff, maybe?). Obviously the collaboration with Orago, for the youth team is also called into question. These are extremely important, albeit marginal aspects in a future that, at this point, has to be written. We will know more in the next few hours, after the press conference announced by the two clubs. But for the moment, we have had enough news to “digest”.