ZAGREB, October 26, 2020 - Orlando Rivetti, doyen of Croatian sports journalism, has gone on his final journey at the age of 68. He departed while writing. Literally until his last breath.
His last commentary in Sportske novosti on the day of his passing left “plush football shoes” and “chocolate candies” behind, the epithets that he bestowed on the Rijeka FC First League team after their win against Varaždin FC in his distinctive way, because... Orlando always had a peculiar style of writing, sparing no epithets when praise was in order, nor hesitating to criticise when a rebuke was necessary. And he always remained eternally devoted to the written word. Even in the years when he tried another medium, hosting the Orlando Show on Rijeka's Kanal Ri TV, he truly consumed newspapers in their original form, on the “greasy” whiteness of which he would draft his columns.
All who have known Orlando at least a little bit know that until his last day he remained a romantic of the sports journalism of that “archaic” time, when journalists lived this profession with their heart and soul. To the fullest. When the best texts and columns meant staying up all nights, when the first editions were impatiently awaited, when the written word carried weight and when its “value” was not measured by the number of “likes” and “clicks”, when it was journalistic doyens and not desk jockeys who wrote about sports and when only the truth without compromise was valued. Those were the times...
He was a long-time sports department editor at Novi list. In recent history, it included a generation of journalists who were “thrown into the fire” by Orlando himself, who directed them to be excellent reporters and columnists, editors and layout designers at the same time and never held them back from being themselves, unique, original. He was an editor who always stood behind his people, even then when they made unintentional mistakes or when they ruffled some feathers with their attitudes. Regardless of who it bothered, a particular dignitary or an average Joe. That was Orlando...
He was unreservedly devoted to journalism. This is why his private life often suffered, as did his family before all, although it was in his family that he always found strength, inspiration and refuge at the end of the day, or - more frequently - night, because... Rare are the journalists today who live journalism 24/7, especially those who live journalism as passionately as Orlando did from the first to the last day.
He dove into journalism at La Voce del popolo and remained faithful to it until the end. In the meantime, he wrote for the Sportske novosti, Jutarnji list and, of course, Novi list newspapers. He would come by Novi list regularly even when he stopped writing for it due to retirement, which he never wanted to accept. Orlando always said that journalism must not remain clamped in “legal shackles” and that journalists must write until their last breath. This is exactly how he departed...
