Ugo Gori: “After retiring I will open an ice cream shop. Italy can break the taboo of the summer tour. Benetton fantastic”

Edoardo “Ugo” Gori ended his rugby career at 34: he did it in France, wearing the Colomiers shirt, where he spent the last years of a long career (69 caps with Italy) and full of satisfactions. There is disappointment after his “The last dance”, but Gori has no regrets, he knows that the moment had come: “I have known for many years that this would be my last contract. I had signed the last three-year contract with Colomiers knowing that after that I would stop: I have a bit of a shoulder problem, and my knees are also a bit bad, I’m quite physically tired and the time has come to stop and think about other things ” he told OnRugby.

What will you do after retirement?

“I would like to open an ice cream shop here in France. I did a cooking course similar to our hotel and then a master’s degree in economics, it’s an idea I’ve been thinking about for years and now an opportunity has arisen. It’s one of the dreams I had as a child, I hope I can make it come true.”

You are also very active in the kitchen on the web…

“Yes, it’s my second passion after rugby. My father has always been passionate, in my house food is a moment of sharing, and here in France I decided to attend a French cooking course to have important foundations to then combine with Italian cuisine, which is becoming popular here, they are opening many Italian restaurants and pizzerias. In the end, Italian cuisine is the best in the world, there is little that can be done. I really like cooking and one day I would also like to be a home chef, for now I make a few videos on social media, then in the future we’ll see, for now I’ll dedicate myself to the ice cream shop”.

Will there still be room for rugby?

“For the moment I would like to take a break, since I entered the Academy at 17 I have only thought about the oval ball. I’d like to coach kids, dedicate myself to grassroots rugby, but purely out of passion. For the rest I would like to get away.”

You have had a long career, both at club and national level. What are the most beautiful moments that you carry inside you?

“There are so many, it’s difficult to choose. I would start from his debut in the national team, both with the Under 20s and with the senior team in Florence. Winning against South Africa was incredible. But also the first victory with Colomiers was very emotional for me: I came from a period in which I never played, here I found confidence and trust again and it was a very good period of my career. And then there’s Edinburgh, in 2015 with Scotland, who can forget it. But also many victories in Treviso, especially in Monigo. There are so many memories.”

About Monigo. Are you following Benetton? How important is that stadium and the Treviso fans?

“It’s very important. The stadium is your home, if you are a player, it is where you grow up and where there are the people with whom you share most of the day. And the fans are fundamental. The Treviso public has always been available and close to the team. Benetton is having an incredible season this year, I’m following them from afar but this team is really performing very well. They managed to create team chemistry and high-level playing quality and can still get a lot of satisfaction. It’s just a shame about the Cup semi-final against Gloucester, I saw it from France and I was really disappointed: perhaps the boys aren’t yet used to experiencing that kind of pressure that a semi-final gives you, but it’s a really good team. There are many guys who could play anywhere in Europe.”

You talked about the best moments. What are your regrets?

“I don’t have many actually. I have always done my best, and when you realize you can’t achieve certain things you have to accept your limits. Maybe I have one: at 19 I hurt my shoulder, then playing football-tennis with the physiotherapist I slipped and also injured my knee, which then affected my career: I should have been more professional on that occasion. Then maybe I would have liked to go abroad first, maybe spend a few years in England. When I arrived in France I often asked myself ‘why didn’t I come earlier?’, but I had a great time in Treviso and this is what influenced me and didn’t make me leave earlier”.

Aren’t you sorry you missed out on promotion to the Top 14? Colomiers always came close but missed the last step…

“Yes, it would have been very nice. The year of the pandemic we were first in the standings in February, when they interrupted the championship and froze promotions, perhaps we could have made it. But we are a small club and perhaps in the Top 14 we wouldn’t have managed in terms of budget, it would have been very difficult and we probably would have had a year of suffering and defeats. In Pro D2, however, we are always competitive, which is better than being last in the Top 14. In the end, that’s fine. Clearly I would have liked to spend a year in such an important championship, but perhaps I didn’t have the ability, in the end not everyone can do it.”

Speaking of great seasons, we can’t help but mention this year’s Six Nations…

“My goodness, incredible. It’s a shame about the match against France, it would have crowned a wonderful tournament. This Italy plays well, but in reality they have already been doing so for a few years even if before they had not managed to get the satisfaction they deserved. I know how difficult it is, we went through it too when we were younger: you suffer every match, they insult you, and in the end you manage to bring home a historic result. It’s a shame that we only finished fifth with 2 wins and a draw, we deserved more, but in the end it was a really tight Six Nations. We hope to continue on this path, it would be important for the whole movement.”

Now there are three treacherous challenges: Samoa, Tonga and Japan. Italy, historically, suffers greatly from summer tours. We saw it in 2022 but also in 2017, when you were there, and there was that semi-disaster with Scotland, Fiji and Australia. Why are the Azzurri struggling so much?

“It’s a very difficult tour because it comes at the end of a very long season. Maybe as fans we don’t realize the difficulty of a rugby season: the beatings, the training, the pressure of every weekend. You arrive at the summer tour feeling really tired, maybe you don’t have great depth and you face teams that are starting the season instead, and then you also add the very long trips and the matches against teams that are going through periods of great form.”

In your opinion, can Italy break this taboo?

“I think so because compared to when I played in the national team there is much more competitiveness and depth, and as I said before this can make the difference. If they always play the same ones, the fatigue increases, because maybe you find yourself fielding a boy who has already played 25 games in a year and is tired. The young guys who have played less, who put a little spice in the asses of the old ones (laughs, ed.) can lend a hand because they increase the depth and above all the quality: it doesn’t matter who plays, the level is practically the same himself, and this is important. Then every young boy is hungry and willing to win his place and pushes the owner to do better.”

The Azzurri can currently count on 4 very different scrum midfielders. Can you give us a bit of a technical examination of what each of them can offer? Which do you like more?

“Yes, they are 4 important guys who, despite being different, can give quality to the team and they are all important. Varney is perhaps a little more technical, and playing in England he knows more about the Angolan strategic game and can help the team in difficult moments. I really like Alessandro Garbisi’s ability to attack close to spaces with the ball in hand, as well as Fusco who is even more unpredictable and also on a physical level I think he has an edge over the others, he is very quick, dynamic, he knows how to attack the line. Maybe he is the one closest to me in terms of characteristics. I know Page-Relo because I faced him when he played in Carcassonne: he is a technically very strong and fast player, he has excellent footing and knows how to place, also being of the French school he has a different vision of the game from the others. In the end each of them brings something different, and depending on the match and the moment you can count on all of them and choose the most suitable one. I have a special eye for Garbisi and Fusco because, being Italian, I have seen them grow from an early age, but they are all excellent players.”

And what do you think of Quesada?

“I like him a lot, here in France he has always been spoken about very well, in every team he has coached. The results were certainly important, but we must always remember that they are the result of the incredible work done by Kieran (Crowley) both with Italy and in Treviso, sometimes this work is not recognized as it should. In the end the game of Italy was born from the idea that Crowley had brought. Quesada certainly brought a confidence that wasn’t there before, then he’s Latin and this helps us Italians a lot to relate to him, and he has great human qualities.”

Francesco Palma

onrugby.it © all rights reserved