11 questions with Angela Andreoli: Get to know the 16-year old Italian spitfire ready to take the world by storm!
By Aoife Cassidy
Angela Andreoli — remember the name! The 16-year-old from Brescia, Italy has had quite the year so far. Andreoli, in her first year as a senior gymnast, helped the Italian team take gold at both the Mediterranean Games and European Championships. And in addition, she won bronze on vault at the Mediterranean Games and bronze on floor at the European Championships. Andreoli has slotted in perfectly to the already dynamite Italian team and has proved her worth to the tremendously talented group.
The Italians have been on the radar for a number of years as being ‘the team of the future’ due to the group of amazingly talented juniors coming through the ranks throughout the mid 2010’s. Now those juniors are the senior team and they are really hitting their stride. The team, comprised of the D’Amato twins, Giorgia Villa, Elisa Iorio and Martina Maggio as the main players, won bronze at the World Championships in 2019, gold at this years’ European Championships and just missed out on a medal at the 2020 Olympic Games, placing 4th after a hard-fought battle with Great Britain.
Individually, the Italian women have also had success, taking home European, World, Youth Olympic and Olympic medals throughout the last quadrennium.
Andreoli seems to be fitting right in with these rockstars! This year, the youngster has performed the third highest difficulty in the world on both balance beam and floor exercise, performing a massive 6.5 on beam and 5.8 on floor.
Andreoli trains at the renowned Brixia club in Brescia, Italy just outside of the city of Milan. The club has produced a number of Italian national team members and world-renowned gymnasts including 2006 World champion and 2020 Olympic medalist, Vanessa Ferrari, current European All-Around champion, Asia D’Amato and Youth Olympic All-Around champion and World and European medalist, Giorgia Villa among a host of other well known names.
In a storybook kind of way, Italian gymnastics is coming full circle with the introduction of Andreoli on to the international stage. Andreoli was born in 2006, the year Ferrari burst onto the scene and took the World title. Now Andreoli, a gymnast with similar power and pizazz who trains at the very same club, seems to be following a similar trajectory!
Watch out world, Angela is coming!
Inside Gymnastics caught up with Angela to discuss her hopes for the upcoming World Championships, her thoughts on becoming European champion & more!
