Edited press release from EEF
Italy won Sunday's CSIO3* 1.45m Longines EEF Nations Cup in Athens, Greece. Led by Chef d’Equipe Marco Porro, the Italian team – consisting of Omar Bonomelli on Chippendel de la Tour (Conrad x For Pleasure), Emilio Bicocchi on Delirio delle Sementarecce (Kapitol d'Argonne x Concorde), Paolo Paini on Japonica di Ca’ San Giorgio (Kannan x Contendro) and Bruno Chimirri on Samara (Cardento x Canturo) – finished the two rounds on a total of eight faults, winning without the fourth member of the team, Bruno Chimirri riding Samara, having to jump in the second round. Greece finished second on 16 faults, with Romania third on 17 faults and Bulgaria fourth on 36.
Italian Chef d'Equipe Marco Porro said: “We are happy about this win. This is my first year as Italy’s Chef d’Equipe, having accompanied the second division team last year. We are rebuilding the team with young horses and riders and today we fielded three 8-year-old horses, all bred in Italy. So we’re starting over from here, from Athens, so as to gain points and our next shows will be in Gorla, Budapest and Warsaw where we won the final last year."
“Italy has a tradition in winning the Nations Cup in Greece and in Athens," Emilio Bicocchi said. "I have ridden in many Nations Cups here and was also here for the 2004 Olympics. Today was a big win for Italy. We are very happy with the way our young horses jumped today, they did a really good job."