Editorial board
June 13, 2021 2:09 pm
Antenore Energia Virtus Padova has announced that the new head coach for the 2021/22 season is Riccardo De Nicolao, born in Padua in 1988, former assistant of coach Daniele Rubini and former head coach of Under 18 virtussina. De Nicolao becomes the first coach following the shadows of his father Pierluigi who had been the coach of Virtus Padova from 2002 to 2005, before his death in 2008.
By Nicolao
“I am honored for this opportunity and I thank the club for thinking of me to start a new course – comments the new neroverde technician – I am very happy with the trust that the Bernardi family, the management and the Ds Rugo have placed in me. DG Nicola Bernardi’s sincere esteem for me and I didn’t think about it for a second before saying yes. It will be an experience to be taken on the one hand with enthusiasm because a new experience starts but on the other hand also with full assumption of responsibility: it is a prestigious position in a historic club, to be the head coach of the first team of Padua. for me it is an honor. In recent years I have always shared many of Daniele Rubini’s game ideas otherwise it would have been impossible to make him the deputy, so there will be a sort of technical continuity, even if obviously on the details each coach bears his own mark. Ours will be a basketball mix between youth sector play with quick readings and more structured senior play. The project remains ambitious: we will always take the field to try to win every game. Finally, on a personal level it is a dream come true: I grew up going to see Virtus matches with my father as a coach and arriving at the same place occupied by him is certainly a little fairy tale ».
