Brave in their respective disciplines, but in the age of social media who is the Italian athlete of the 2020 Tokyo Olympics most followed on social media?
Some don't have Facebook, others Twitter, others still neglect YouTube or TikTok, but no one misses out on Instagram.
These are the Italian athletes who qualified for the Tokyo 2020 Olympics, the most "digital" of all time but which will probably be less so than those taking place next year.
From year to year, the world confirms the "digital" direction it took more than a decade ago, and the Covid-19 pandemic, between restrictions and long-distance relationships, has only increased the speed with which the digitalization of the world is advancing. The Tokyo 2020 Olympics themselves couldn't accommodate the audience in the stands that would have been there in a less atypical time than we've been experiencing for the past year, so many sports fans have made up for it with live streaming and... social! Looking for them on Instagram, as mentioned, you go on the safe side: the immense Federica Pellegrini for example reaches 2 million profiles between Instagram and Twitter, but is not present on Facebook. Let's take a look at everything in detail with the Italian athletes of the Olympics most followed on social networks.
Federica Pellegrini: social gold medalist
As just mentioned, the Italian athlete of the 2020 Tokyo Olympics with the most followers on social media is the swimmer Federica Pellegrini, who reaches two million followers: on Instagram she has more than 1.3 million, on Twitter more than 700,000 while on Facebook she is not present except for her fan club with more than 200,000 members, which obviously cannot be counted.
About 500 thousand followers pass between the 33 year old from Veneto and a basketball icon like Danilo Gallinari, who boasts an equal distribution of followers among the three main social networks and slightly exceeds one and a half million profiles reached all over the world, and for Danilo it is more than ever since the several years spent in the USA for the NBA have guaranteed him followers from all over the world.
Nearly distant is Sicilian cyclist Vincenzo Nibali, who boasts an even more balanced distribution of followers across the three social networks than Gallinari. The one and a half million subscribers to his channels crown the cyclist, a veteran of Giro d'Italia and Tour de France, at his fourth Olympic event, bronze medal among the Italian athletes of the 2020 Tokyo Olympics most followed on social networks.
The first place off the podium is occupied by Ivan Zaytsev nicknamed "the czar" of Italian volleyball, who has a strong presence on Instagram and Facebook (one million and 200 thousand followers) and "on the side" on Twitter where he slightly exceeds 50 thousand.
Three tennis players in the top 10
The fifth and sixth position of the Italian social ranking of the Tokyo 2020 Olympics are occupied by two tennis players of international fame: fifth is Fabio Fognini from Liguria, with over 800 thousand followers coming mostly from Instagram where he has almost 600 thousand, just behind the 30-year-old from Macerata, Camila Giorgi, who has almost 800 thousand followers without using Twitter, a social network where she does not have a profile.
Seventh the basketball player Niccolò Mannion, present only on Instagram (more than 500 thousand followers), eighth Frank Chamizo who has the three main social networks but from Facebook and Twitter he collects very little of the more than 500 thousand total followers, ninth the Alto Adige tennis player Jannik Sinner with more than 400 thousand followers, while the cyclist Letizia Paternoster closes the top 10 with almost 400 thousand followers from the three main social networks.