NAME the following person. He is an Italian media tycoon, his family controlled company is not quoted on the stock market, he owns a successful football team, he owns nationwide television channels, he is an elected parliamentarian and he has a blond, highly photogenic wife.
Silvio Berlusconi? Wrong, the answer is Vittorio Cecchi Gori. However, the parallells with Berlusconi are there for all to see and are such that we might now be looking at an all Italian recipe for commercio-politico-sporting, success.
Vittorio Cecchi Gori (53) is a senator and owns Italy's largest film production and distribution company, the nationwide TV channels, Telemontecarlo and. Videomusic, the Fiorentina soccer club and 60 cinemas.
He claims to have no serious political ambitions at present. But if he were to develop such ambitions, he is well positioned to follow in the glorious path of TV democracy already traced by his colleague, one time business partner and now business rival, Mr Berlusconi.
For the last week Vittorio Cecci Gori has been the most talked about man in Italy. He has had the temerity to outbid Italian state broadcaster RAI for the television rights to soccer.
Last week the Cecchi Gori "Group offered $400 million over a three year period for a package of TV, radio and foreign rights to Italian soccer, ending the 40 year old virtual state monopoly of RAI. He also signalled his own arrival at the top of the greasy pole of Italian media business life.
Later this month, you may be hearing more about Cecchi Gori. II Postino, a film produced by his company, has received five Oscar nominations. A month later, Fiorentina are due to contest the, Italian Cup final, at the end of a sparkling season in which they have provided the major opposition to league leaders, AC Milan, owned by former prime minister and media tycoon, Silvio Berlusconi.
Next month the Italian electorate will be hearing about Senator Cecchi Gori as he attempts to secure re election as a centre left candidate within the "Olive" coalition.
Originally a member of the ex-Christian Democrat "Segni Pact", led by the mercurial constitutional reformer Mario Segni, Mr Cecchi Gori and Segni alike have now been absorbed into the brand new, "Dini Italian Renewal" movement, founded by the current Italian Prime Minister Lamberto Dini just last week.
It may be coincidental, too, but in recent times the same Prime Minister Dini has taken to appearing alongside Mr Cecchi Gori in the VIP box at Fiorentina matches. Fiorentina, of course, is a Florence based club, and both Mr Dini and Mr Cecchi Gori will probably stand in Florence constituencies in the April 21st general election.
The rise and rise of Mr Cecchi Gori may not yet have reached its peak. One does wonder, how ever, about his commitment to a nonpolitical role.
The manner of the recent termination of the working collaboration between two senior journalists former RAI reporter Sandro Curzi and Rome Economist correspondent Tana de Zulueta with Videomusic and Telemontecarlo, respectively, at the very feast suggests something autocratic about Mr Cecchi Gori's working methods.
We are reminded of the occasion three years, ago when he sacked a Fiorentina coach, the experienced "Gigi" Radice. The sacking of the coach prompted a dramatic decline in Fiorentina fortunes which culminated with the side's relegation to division two, for the first time in 56 years.
However, before branding such management a fiasco, bear in mind that Mr Cecchi Gori and associates reshaped the club and brought it aback to division one immediately, where it is now riding high.
Moral do not underestimate Mr Cecchi Gori and his all Italian recipe for success.