Nino Benvenuti is dead, farewell to the legend of Italian boxing | The reactions

Nino Benvenuti , an icon of Italian and world boxing, has died in Rome at the age of 87. He had been ill for some time. Born in Isola d'Istria on April 26, 1938, Benvenuti was the Olympic welterweight champion at the 1960 Rome Olympic Games, the world super welterweight champion between 1965 and 1966, the European middleweight champion between 1965 and 1967, and the world middleweight champion between 1967 and 1970. In 1968 he won the prestigious Fighter of the Year award and in 1992 he was inducted into the International Boxing Hall of Fame, the first Italian to receive both awards.

Benvenuti-Griffith, the meeting that kept Italy awake

The meeting with the American Emile Griffith , on April 17, 1967, told on the radio by Paolo Valenti , kept almost 18 million Italians awake and gave Benvenuti the title of world middleweight champion. A complete, calculating and precise boxer, Benvenuti made technique and speed his best weapons in the ring. Qualities that kept him at high levels well beyond the age of 30, which for the time was a real feat.

Benvenuti's Rivalries

Benvenuti was the only Italian boxer to have held the world title in two weight categories (middleweight and superwelterweight). Before him, among European boxers, only Marcel Cerdan had managed to conquer the world middleweight title on American soil. The four consecutive victorious defenses of the world middleweight title place him behind only Marvin Hagler and Carlos Monzón . In 1999, the International Boxing Hall of Fame recognized him among the greatest boxers of all time, the only Italian boxer together with Duilio Loi. His entry into the National Italian-American Sport Hall of Fame also consecrated him (as well as legends such as Rocky Marciano and Joe Di Maggio ) to the most glorious pages of world Italian-American sport.

Welcome and the gold of Rome 1960

The consecration comes at the Rome Games in 60 where he wins the gold medal in the welterweight category, beating the Soviet Jurij Radonjak in the final. Benvenuti wins, in addition to the gold, also the prestigious 'Val Barker' cup, awarded to the technically best boxer of the tournament, preceding the light heavyweight Cassius Clay.

Benvenuti's Rivalries: Mazzinghi, Griffith and Monzon

His professional career in super welterweight and middleweight saw Benvenuti as the protagonist of three legendary rivalries: in Italy with Sandro Mazzinghi , at international level with Emile Griffith and Carlos Monzon . The rivalry with Mazzinghi divided Italy in the 60s like that between Fausto Coppi and Gino Bartali. Tall, blond and with an elegant bearing, Benvenuti was the idol of women. Short and stocky, Mazzinghi was the classic boxer who came from the streets. Benvenuti won both matches played in 1965 valid for the world super welterweight championship. There was never any love lost between the two, until the peace sealed on the occasion of the 50th anniversary of their legendary matches.

Bevenuti's other two great rivalries were against two middleweight legends, the American Griffith and the Argentine Monzon. The boxer from Trieste would become great friends with both of them, Griffith would also be godfather to one of his children. Benvenuti fought 5 matches against Griffith and Monzon that have rightfully entered the history of world boxing. Against the American champion, Bevenuti won in the first and third match, losing in the second. A trilogy that between 1967 and 1968 made millions of Italians dream, with the two victories of the Italian boxer coming in the legendary Madison Square Garden in New York. Against Monzon, however, a Benvenuti who was now getting on in years suffered two very tough defeats in Rome and Monte Carlo. The third-round knockout suffered in the Principality on the night of May 8, 1971 was Benvenuti's last professional match.