On Saturday the 'Tournament of Nations', a youth tournament set to kick off on 25 April for 12 days, was presented at the press room of Udinese's Bluenergy Stadium.
Franco Collavino, the club's general manager, wanted to emphasise the successful collaboration between Udinese and the tournament's organising committee: "Once again this year, for its 20th edition, we are supporting an international youth football event of undoubted competitive value and an important showcase for our region. From the very beginning, the tournament has had a strong cross-border effect, involving Austria and Slovenia. This synergy between the various realities helps promote our territories, such as Nova Gorica, which will be the European Capital of Culture in 2025."
This year the tournament will celebrate its two-decade anniversary. As Nicola Tommasini, president of the amateur sports association Torneo ed Eventi Internazionali, points out the event has "since its origins aimed to promote brotherhood, respect and friendship through sport".
This year the tournament will celebrate its two-decade anniversary. As Nicola Tommasini, president of the amateur sports association Torneo ed Eventi Internazionali, points out the event has "since its origins aimed to promote brotherhood, respect and friendship through sport".
"A strongly European event of worldwide importance, with the presence of promising young under-15 football players, but also a great celebration for the city of Gradisca d'Isonzo and for Friuli Venezia Giulia," he adds. "Having a significant entity such as Udinese Calcio at our side for years has pushed us to improve edition after edition." At the end of his speech, Tommasini presented a plaque of recognition to the head of Udinese's technical area, the former player and Italy international Federico Balzaretti.
Udine is also among the locations that will host matches in the tournament. Chiara Dazzan, the city's councillor for sport, said: "We wanted to create a twinning between sport and culture, since the dates of the Tournament of Nations and the Far East Film Festival coincide. Among the guests at the festival will be illustrious Korean directors and actors, and we have decided, in agreement with the organisers of the football event, to invite the team from the Republic of Korea to the theatre and to organise a day with the group of artists from the country at the football pitch to cheer on their compatriots."
The mayor of Gradisca d'Isonzo, Linda Tomasinsig, recalled that the Tournament of Nations is one of the most important events of the year for the city, not only from a sporting point of view but also from a "social and touristic one". She says: "All of us citizens feel represented by this event, which makes Gradisca known throughout the world."
The regional president of the Italian National Olympic Committee in Friuli Venezia Giulia, Giorgio Brandolin, who together with Franco Tommasini created the Tournament of Nations, underlined how the main objective of this event has been, from the very beginning, to promote the values of friendship, respect and brotherhood through sport in a border land that has gone through a lot of suffering.
"We've succeeded. This is confirmed by the fact that the tournament has reached its 20th edition with the presence of teams from Eastern Europe that were about to join the European Union in 2004 and were already taking part in the football event in which, proudly, we had also managed to include a mixed team of Italian and Slovenian players. This year we will organise, as part of the tournament, some initiatives related to the Milan-Cortina 2026 Winter Olympic Games."