I'm back here on my blog after a long silence period, but I was quite busy with a lot of stuff, including a lot of work on my home course in Novi Ligure to have it ready for the season opening (perhaps I will talk about that in another blogpost).

Next weekend the Italian League 2009 will start so I think it could be a nice idea to present it. The League will qualify the Italian men and ladies team that will take part in EC 2010 in Wien.

The League is open to 7-players male teams and 4-players ladies team and has 4 scheduled days:
- 5th April, Canegrate (bongni)
- 17th May, Naturns (miniaturegolf)
- 7th June, Lozza (bongni)
- 27-28th June, Monza (Italian Championships, miniaturegolf)

No big changes have been made to the best teams since last year, even the new rules allow each team to borrow up to 2 players only for the league from another club not taking part on it, so the situation should be quite similar as concern favourites for the final victory.

About men teams, top favourite is GSP Vergiate as ever. They are the leading italian team by far and shouldn't have any big troubles to confirm that, also because they know extremely well almost all the courses where the 2009 League will be played.
Behind Vergiate we can find a bunch of teams almost on the same level: MGC Novi Ligure (2nd on the 2008 League), MC Monza, GSP Cusano, MT Amatese, GSP Lozza and ASMC Follonica could all fight to get a 2nd place, or a victory in case Vergiate has a bad season.
The minimum goal for each team is to get one of the top 6 final places because they assure the automatic qualification to 2010 League (teams from 7th place and worst will have to play a qualification tournament).
There is a total of 10 teams participating in the 2010 League, beyond those over mentioned, we also have MC I Basilischi Milano, Regional Team Südtirol, GSP Relax Time .

About ladies teams, the title defender MC Monza is still favourite having the most complete team on all surfaces. GSP Cusano could fight them getting a couple of good senior players from MC Aponense (Antonella Flamini, Annalisa Aghito). Another good team could be GSP Lozza which will borrow a couple of players from MMC Paderno.
Also GSP Vergiate and MGC Novi Ligure will take part in the ladies league but they don't seem to be strong enough to fight for the final podium places.

The first day in Canegrate will be very important, because the bad weather we are experiencing in these days won't allow a good preparation of the course for the teams, moreover Canegrate concrete course is quite strange (you can play a 25 round or a 33 round with almost same shots...) so surprises cannot be excluded.

I can only wish good luck to all the teams!» Live results from the 1st day in Canegrate