The Badiali Memorial, Casali sponsors the Memorial to the “Gentle Giant”

The world of volley ball that counts, the world of medicine, institutions and a gala public came together to commemorate the memory of Gianfranco Badiali known as the “gentle giant”, the volley ball champion who played for Kutiba Falconara and the Italian national team, on occasion of the 25th commemoration of his death on 8 January 1988 due to melanoma. To celebrate Gianfranco Badiali both as a man and sportsman who contributed to making the name of Falconara famous in volley ball, the Friends for Sports club together with Falconara Municipality, Lilt, the Ancona division of the Italian Cancer League and the Falconara Marittima Avis organised a event during which sports and medical congresses were held in the first weekend of January at the Falconara Badiali Indoor Sports Stadium. Casali, who has always supported real sport intended as commitment, values and passion, as the sponsor of the event. After the women’s challenge between the Italian National team Volley Master and Badiali Volley Team Rosa Marche, Saturday 5th January saw an exciting new form of volley ball which stirred great interest: a sitting volley match where able-bodied and paralympic athletics play together. The round table debate on the theme “Benign and malignant, what to do” organised by the Giuseppe Ricotti, Director of the INRCA Dermatology Department on Sunday 6th January focused on the importance of prevention in the case of skin disorders; as grand final, the match between Italian National team Volley Master and Badiali Volley Team Master Marche was played in the afternoon. Besides sports champions and former teammates of Badiali many others attended the event including Andrea Zorzi (see photo), a historical name of Italian volley ball and a cornerstone of the invincible “generation of stars” under Julio Velasco, Andrea Anastasi, coach of the men’s Polish national team, Laurent Tillie, technical director of the men’s French national team and Amauri Ribeiro, the outstanding Brazilian volley ball player.