On Sunday night, the Italian men's fencing team beat Japan 45-39 to take the gold in the men's team foil, winning Italy's third gold medal in fencing during the 2012 Olympics.
Unlike the women's team foil gold on Thursday, in which an early lead held out to culminate in a 14-point victory for Italy, the men got off to a slow start, trailing by two points until Andrea Cassarà landed eight touches in the third bout to take the lead.
The score remained close throughout the match, with Cassarà, Giorgio Avola, and Andrea Baldini clinging to a one or two point lead after each bout. Japan evened the score briefly in the sixth bout before Cassarà pulled his team into the lead once again, then he and his team mates landed five touches in each remaining bout to clinch the title.
The Italian men's fencing team was the defending champion of the team foil title, having taken the gold when the event last occurred in Athens in 2004, as in 2008 Games in Beijing new events for women's team foil and women's team sabre had replaced men's team foil. The team almost missed a shot at this year's gold in a close quarter-final match against home team Great Britain. On Friday, they took the bronze in the team epee after losing 45-37 to the gold-medal-winning South Korean team in the semi-final.
The men's team foil was the last of the ten fencing events at this year's Olympics. Half of Italy's gold and overall medals in this year's Olympics have come from fencing—three out of six golds and seven out of fourteen total medals. Italy has the sixth most medals of this year's Olympics heading into Monday's events.
