Emanuela Maccarani was the head coach of the National Rhythmic Gymnastics Teams. Photo: AFP/File
MILAN:
The former coach of Italy’s rhythmic gymnastics team went on trial Tuesday accused of bullying, fuelling questions over the treatment of young athletes as the country hosts the Winter Olympics.
Emanuela Maccarani, a former national team gymnast herself, faces charges of abuse of minors at a court in Monza near Milan, which is hosting part of the Games.
The trial was sparked by explosive claims three years ago by two gymnasts, Nina Corradini and double world champion Anna Basta, who said they quit the sport while still teenagers as a result of psychological abuse by Maccarani.
Basta, who is a civil party in the case along with Corradini and two other gymnasts, will testify at the next hearing on June 10.
Her psychologist will also be called to the stand.
“The goal is to change the method, so that there will be no more situations like (Corradini’s), where she was forced to quit,” Corradini’s lawyer Vipsania Andreicich told journalists at the court.
A number of Italian Olympic gymnast medal winners have been called to testify against Maccarani, including former team captain Elisa Santoni.
Maccarani, who has denied the charges, told journalists there “wasn’t any” abuse.
Five gymnasts who trained with her submitted statements in her defence at a preliminary hearing in September.
The trial must “draw the line” between coaching done “in an authoritative manner… and actions which may have disciplinary implications”, Maccarani’s lawyer Federico Cecconi said.
“It is an issue that affects the entire world of sport,” he said.
But gymnast Basta, asked about team athletes testifying on opposite sides, responded that “there’s always been an attempt to pit athletes against athletes”.
“The focus must remain on the violence and the person who committed it,” she told journalists.
Vulnerable
The sport has come under growing scrutiny, particularly following a sexual abuse scandal in the late 2010s, which saw former Team USA doctor Larry Nassar convicted of molesting girls.
The International Olympic Committee (IOC) has said it has given more attention to mental health in recent years to protect athlete well-being.
While the discipline is not featured at the Winter Games, the world’s top gymnasts are already preparing for the 2028 Olympics in Los Angeles.
Coach Maccarani, 59, led Italy to the top of a sport traditionally dominated by countries from the former Soviet bloc.
But during her near three-decade reign at the Italian team’s National Training Centre in Desio, not far from Monza, days began with gymnasts being weighed in front of one another.
Often a long way from their families and barely out of childhood, they were vulnerable.
Some took laxatives and weighed themselves obsessively. One world champion reported being berated for eating a pear.
The affair appeared to be over in September 2023 when Maccarani was given a simple warning by the disciplinary tribunal of the country’s gymnastics federation (FGI) and handed back the reins of the national team, nicknamed the “Butterflies”.
But in March last year the FGI, under new president Andrea Facci, sacked Maccarani.
The FGI’s official explanation to AFP at the time of her dismissal was that the organisation wanted to “open a new cycle in preparation for the 2028 Los Angeles Olympics”.
Corradini, whose testimony led the Monza prosecutor’s office to open an investigation, told AFP last year she was happy for “the young athletes who will now join the national team and who will surely have a different experience”.
