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Italian Football League

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Italian Football League
SportAmerican football
Founded1980
CEOEnrico Mambelli[1][2]
No. of teamsMax 12
Country Italy
Most recent
champion(s)
Firenze Guelfi
Official websiteAFI Italy

Italian Football League (IFL) is the top level American football league in Italy established in 1980.

In 1980 the first American football league in Italy was established and crowned a champion. The Italian league (Series A) in the early 1980's was one of the first leagues in Europe to sign professional import players and coaches from the USA. The league had good popularity in the early years especially the late 1980's and early 1990's with reported attendance of 30,000 fans for a Series A league final championship game in that time period. American Football in Italy has had ups and downs since that time but has always had a competitive league with different lower levels playing below the Italian Football League (IFL).

History

The new IFL was founded in 2008, taking over previous league's significance called (National Football League Italy). The league was born as a result of the escape of several of the best clubs of the old championship organized by the Italian federation, such as Milano Rhinos, Parma Panthers, Bologna Doves and Bolzano Giants. However some of the historic Italian clubs have not joined the new league and continue to participate in different tournaments organized by other federations. This is the case of Legnano Frogs, Torino Giaguari, etc. In the following years a lot of teams moved to the Federazione Italiana di American Football (the federation the IFL belongs to) and most of the biggest teams are now part of the IFL that is the First Division or in the other two divisions.

IFL teams

† defunct
♦ due to league expansion the Napoli team can play the 2015 IFL season and is not relegated to the second division
‡ Roma Grizzlies won the second division championship and earned the right to play the 2015 IFL season[3]

Italian Bowl

Results from 2008 to 2022. The championship game was previously named Italian Super Bowl

Date Winner Opponent Result Location Television
July 19, 2008 Bergamo Lions Giants Bolzano 56–54 Stadio Comunale, San Giovanni in Marignano
June 29, 2009 Giants Bolzano Marines Lazio 35–21 Stadio Dei Pini, Milano Marittima
June 29, 2010 Panthers Parma Elephants Catania 56–26 Stadio Breda, Sesto San Giovanni RAI Sport 1, Dahlia TV, Sportitalia
July 9, 2011 Panthers Parma Warriors Bologna 76–62 Stadio XXV Aprile, Parma RAI Sport 1, Dahlia TV, Sportitalia
July 7, 2012 Panthers Parma Elephants Catania 61–43 Stadio Franco Ossola, Varese RAI Sport 1, Eurosport 2, Sportitalia
July 6, 2013 Panthers Parma Milano Seamen 51–28 Stadio Paolo Mazza, Ferrara RAI Sport 1, Eurosport 2
July 6, 2014 Milano Seamen Panthers Parma 33–30 Stadio Paolo Mazza, Ferrara RAI Sport 1, Eurosport 2, Sportitalia, 7gold
July 4, 2015 Milano Seamen Panthers Parma 24–14 Velodromo Vigorelli, Milan Sportitalia
July 9, 2016 Rhinos Milano Giants Bolzano 44–18 Stadio Dino Manuzzi, Cesena
July 8, 2017 Milano Seamen Rhinos Milano 37–29 Stadio Romeo Menti, Vicenza
July 7, 2018 Milano Seamen Giants Bolzano 28–14 Stadio Sergio Lanfranchi, Parma
July 6, 2019 Milano Seamen Firenze Guelfi 62–28 Stadio Breda, Sesto San Giovanni
July 17, 2021 Panthers Parma Milano Seamen 40–34 (OT) Stadio Leonardo Garilli, Piacenza
July 2, 2022 Firenze Guelfi Milano Seamen 21–17 Stadio Renato Dall'Ara, Bologna

MVP Italian Bowl

Until 2014 the championship game was called Superbowl italiano.

References

  1. ^ [1] Archived 2015-02-12 at the Wayback Machine https://web.archive.org/web/20150315023625/http://www.ifleague.it/news/2757-enrico-mambelli-presidente
  2. ^ "Archived copy". Archived from the original on February 12, 2015. Retrieved February 12, 2015.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: archived copy as title (link)
  3. ^ "I Grizzlies sbranano gli Elephants - Sport Locale - iltempo". Archived from the original on 2014-10-28. Retrieved 2014-10-28.