Italian Leadership & Captains (Part 2)

Wearing the captain's arm-band of the Nazionale during a World Cup is the ultimate dream of any Italian kid who starts playing football. In a country that is always bombed by controversies and scandals, being the captain of the national team is not an easy job. In fact, this job can be as stressful as it is rewarding. It is a tough job due to the fact that the captain has to always be the first one of the players in taking responsibility for any negative thing might happen around the team.

However, one thing has to be said, being the captain in Italy is always much more prestigious than in other countries (with a few exception, of course) just for the fact that Italy has always high chances of becoming world champion. Four of Italy's captains have had the insuperable honor of lifting the trophy to the sky to celebrate a World Cup victory: Giampiero Combi, Giuseppe Meazza, Dino Zoff, and Fabio Cannavaro. 

Here is the full list of all the captains that have led the Nazionale to the glorious journey of the World Cups: 

- 1934: Giampiero Combi (1902-1956). Goalkeeper. 47 international caps with Italy. World Champion.  

- 1938: Giuseppe Meazza (1910-1979). Forward. Considered the best Italian player of all time. 53 international caps (33 goals). World Champion in 1934 and 1938. So legendary he even got the name of a stadium in his honor. 

- 1950: Riccardo Carapellese (1922-1995). Forward. 16 international caps (10 goals).

- 1954: Giampiero Boniperti (1928). Forward. 38 international caps (8 goals). 

- 1958: Italy did not participate in this world cup.

- 1962: Lorenzo Buffon (1929). Goalkeeper. Distant relative of Gianluigi Buffon. 15 international caps. 

- 1966: Sandro Salvadore (1939-2007). Defender. 36 international caps. Euro-Cup winner in 1968. 

- 1970-1974: Giacinto Facchetti (1942-2006). Left back. Absolute legend. 94 international caps (3 goals). World Cup finalist. Also captain-winner of Euro 68.

- 1978-1982: Dino Zoff (1942). Goalkeeper. Dino holds the world's record for the longest time without receiving goals in international tournaments (1142 minutes) between 1972 and 1974. First Italian in reaching over 100 international caps (112). Oldest winner ever of the World Cup (40 years and 4 months). Only Italian in history that has won both the Euro-Cup (1968) and the World Cup (1982).

- 1986: Gaetano Scirea (1953-1989). Defender. 72 international caps (2 goals). World Champion in 1982. 

-1990: Giuseppe Bergomi (1963). Defender. 81 international games (6 goals). World Champion in 1982.  

- 1994: Franco Baresi (1960). Defender. 81 international caps (1 goal). Absolute legend. World Champion in 1982. World Cup finalist in 1994.

- 1998-2002: Paolo Maldini (1968). Left back. Holds the record of most minute played in World Cup history (2216). Absolute legend. 126 international caps (7 goals). World Cup finalist in 1994. Euro-Cup finalist 2000.

- 2006-2010: Fabio Cannavaro (1973). Defender. Golden Ball and FIFA World Player in 2006. 136 international caps (2 goals). World Champion. Euro-Cup finalist 2000.

  

- 2014: If nothing major happens, it will be Gianluigi Buffon (1978) the captain and leader of the Nazionale. 133 international caps, he will soon overpass Cannavaro. World Champion 2006. Euro-Cup finalist 2012.

- For after Buffon, the next captain will most likely be Daniele De Rossi (1983). Capitan Futuro. At 90 international caps, he is soon to join Zoff, Maldini, Cannavaro, Buffon, and Pirlo to the centenarian club. 

- Special mention to Francesco Calí (1882-1949) for being the first captain ever of the Italian Nazionale's in 1910. 

- Second special mention to Giuseppe Rossi (1987) for representing Italy as the captain at the age of 23 for one game. 

It is an absolute honor to have been and be represented by such great individuals and true captains. I am sure that our glorious Nazionale will continue to have the same kind of leaders for the future as well. 

#ForzaItalia

Italian Leadership & Captains (Part 1)

The history of the Nazionale has been characterized by having legendary captains that, beyond being great football players, they were first incredible men with an immense sense of leadership and human value.

Let's be honest, the Nazionale never won titles purely relying on actual talent. Even though many of its leaders were very talented with the ball in their feet, it is not this quality that has given Italy the high amount of titles it has. If talent was the major component of a glorious team such as Italy, we would remember more the various Zola, Mancini, Chiesa, Di Natale rather than the various Gattuso, Dino Baggio, Oriali, Gentile and so on.

Of course, in such a rich history like the one of Italian football, it has also been the case that the leader of particular generation happens to be the most talented player in the team. Think of today's Nazionale: the two main leaders are Gianluigi Buffon and Andrea Pirlo. Do I need to say more? Both them are absolute top-class talents in the world of football, one as a goalkeeper and the other one as field player. 

However, this is not always the case. It is a well known fact that every team, and even every player, achieves success by taking advantage of their own strengths to the fullest, and by relying the least they can on their biggest weaknesses. Essentially, a team whose players are not particularly good at heading the ball won't try to rely on air play to win matches.

The Italian Nazionale is a clear example of this. Analyzing pure talent player by player, we never have the best team. If we looked at the rosters or Argentina and Spain, for example, their players are much more talented than ours. Yet, Italy has one more World Cup than Argentina and Spain combined. 

This happens because Italian players are almost always able to go beyond their capabilities. In decisive moments, they go through some kind of transformation in which they become stronger than everything and everyone: the other teams, the controversies, the media, negative supporters, and so on.

This point is demonstrated by the fact that, compared to other countries, some of our great heroes of our past are players who did not particularly had notorious careers other than one specific tournament at the highest levels. 

The most recent example of this is, without a doubt, Fabio Grosso. For one single month, he became the world's best player as he achieved the ultimate dream of every kid around the world: Scoring the last penalty kick to give a country the title of champion of the world, in addition to scoring a late winner goal in a World Cup semifinal against the home team in a stadium in which such team had never lost before. These are experiences that even the history's best players could have the opportunity to live.

Along the Nazionale's history, there are many other examples. Salvatore Schillaci's celebrations are the most remembered images of the Nazionale in World Cup 1990. Scoring six goals, he became the main character of the famous "Notti Magiche" of the tournament, leading Italy to a final third place. 

Like Grosso, Schillaci didn't also have a notorious career, besides the magnificent World Cup. Even though he should have been a world champion too, he only played five seasons in Italian Serie A, scoring "only" 37 goals. Insignificant to the 119 goals of Cristiano Lucarelli in Serie A, who barely played six games in Nazionale. 

Even Paolo Rossi, who did have an overall great career, reached his maximum peak in World Cup 1982, leading Italy to the title of world champion in 1982 with six goals, including a hat-trick against the great Brazil. 

Every generation of the Nazionale has always had a strong component of leadership, way beyond the actual player who wears the arm-band. This is exactly what makes Italy so glorious: being able to rely on great individuals that will give it all and act like leaders in decisive and specific moments: 

- Dino Baggio scoring a late goal against Norway in World Cup1994, saving Italy and Sacchi from a huge shame.

- Fabio Cannavaro leading and starting the counter-attack in World Cup 2006 semifinal, recovering the ball twice in 5 seconds right when Germany was attacking trying to tie the game. The counter-attack resulted in Del Piero's goal. 

- Marco Materazzi tying the final in 2006 after having caused the penalty kick for France, minutes before. 

- Andrea Pirlo chipping the ball to Joe Hart in penalty series against England in Euro 2012. England was winning the series, and this episode totally sent British players out of their place. 

- Tarcisio Burnich, center defender who never went beyond midfield, finally going forward and tying the semifinal vs Germany in World Cup 1970 semifinal in extra time right after Germany went up in the score board. The game of the century.

- Claudio Gentile being the worst (or maybe the only) nightmare of Maradona in World Cup 1982.

- Alessandro Del Piero playing as a side back for most of the Euro 2000 semifinal vs home team Holland, as the Nazionale played in 10 after Zambrotta's red card. 

- Christian Panucci tying the match against Romania in Euro 2008, a minute after Romania scored. 

I could go on forever with these examples. There are many more. As well as there are way more cases of "silent" leaders who were very important for Italy, like Gattuso, Oriali, and Giannini. 

Italy, moreover, has also had the luck of being represented by heroic individuals who actually wore the arm-band. In the second part of this post, I will list and post pictures of all the main captains the Nazionale had in every single World Cup. 

Thanks for reading and #ForzaItalia

The Azzurri singing Azzurro by Adriano Celentano

Awesome people, great singers, and even better football players.

Trapattoni's Nazionale (precisely of the period 2003-04) recorded and sang Celentano's historic song for a good cause in support of the AIC tournament of solidarity!

Noticeable the singing talent of Massimo Oddo, who in 2006 was also the barber for teammates and manager Marcello Lippi. Multifunctional right back!

Enjoy

Via +YouTube 

Nazionale, what do we get from the Confederations Cup 2013

The director of the Corriere Dello Sport, Paolo De Paola, manifested through his blog that it shouldn't be OK for a country that has won four World Cups to be satisfied by just doing a good job.

Italian football has evolved in the last years, and, due to the economic crisis and also to many bad decisions taken, its overall tendency and performance have strongly decreased. With this, also the standards of the supporters have consistently lowered, in such that it is acceptable for the Nazionale and club teams to lose against the world's best teams.

In a sense, De Paola is right. Certainly, there is some degree of mediocrity in this new approach that has risen in Italy. Essentially, it should not be acceptable to lose a European final by four goals or to be satisfied with a Confederations Cup that left us with two suffered victories over Mexico and Japan (this one, totally undeserved), a regular second half against Brazil and good performance against Spain in semifinals.

If we look into the Nazionale's history as a whole, then certain things are totally not acceptable. Beyond the fact that only Brazil is above us in World Cup titles, the glory of our Calcio is not only limited to the actual four World Cups.

As a matter of fact, our glory is much more than that as our history is characterized by such a great number of legendary players, managers, specific matches, records, and so on. Italy has played many great tournaments that, even though they didn't result in final victory, they wrote the history of world's football history:

- The 4-3 win over Germany in 1970 World Cup semifinal, known as the Game of the Century.
- The historic performance of Franco Baresi in 1994 World Cup final, only three weeks after havign surgery on his knee.
- Paolo Maldini's record of minutes played in World Cups (2216)
- Marco Tardelli's celebration goal in 1982 World Cup final. By far, one of the most remembered celebrations in the world.

These are only four examples. There are many more.

However, if we looked into the Nazionale's history in separate parts, and we take into consideration all the difficulties we've had in the last eight years, then we could start being satisfied with the performances of Euro 2012 and Confederations Cup 2013.

2010 World Cup could easily be remembered as the worst ever played by Italy. It was the sign of how Calcio suffered the consequences of Calciopoli and other scandals. Far beyond the actual results, Marcello Lippi, who gave us the glory in 2006, did many mistakes managing the team in 2010. With this I don't mean to say that he should have called-up Cassano and even Balotelli because, frankly, I think not calling them was a good decision.

However, what I want to say is that Lippi could have managed the situation better. One thing is to not call Cassano, which (again) it is understandable, and another thing is to create this hateful relationship with fans and journalists prior to a major event.

After the disaster of 2010, the role of managing the Nazionale was assigned to a new different character, Cesare Prandelli, the fancy man who successfully took care of renewing the team and give a new face to the Nazionale.

The improvement from 2010 didn't take much time to be noticed. From the beautiful playing to the the new relationship with the fans, we can say that the Nazionale has risen again. Prandelli has made an excellent job with overall young players, who step by step, have been gaining more confidence with the jersey. Plus, if there is someone to thank for Balotelli's ongoing maturity, this someone is only Cesare.

Moreover, only thanks to the performances of the last two years, is that we can some degree of positive expectations for the 2014 World Cup. Prior to last year's Euro-Cup, expectations were very low, honestly.

After three years of Prandelli, we have many positive results:

- The maturity of Balotelli.
- The establishment in the squad of important players for the future, such as Bonucci, Maggio, Montolivo, Giaccherini, De Sciglio, and Rossi, who will come back stronger than before!
- The experience of veterans such as world champions Buffon, Pirlo, Barzagli, and De Rossi, and Italy's best defender Giorgio Chiellini.

At this point, the only thing that is missing to Prandelli's Nazionale is the real winning spirit that has always characterized Italy. Lippi had it, Bearzot had it, Vicini had it, and many more. Prandelli isn't quite there yet.

But, if Cesare finds the way to stamp a winning spirit to his own Nazionale, this team is ready to do great things. If not, this team will always remain in the "almost."

Anyway, always #ForzaItalia!

Welcome to my blog!

Dear reader,

Thank you for visiting my blog. In this portal, I will go into depth in the analysis of Italian Calcio. Moreover, I will share unique material, such as videos and pictures, that have made the history of Italian football.

Weekly, I will also be sharing various anecdotes and interesting facts about club teams, players, and, of course, the Nazionale (Italian National Team).

Quizzes will belong to this blog as well.

Enjoy and Forza Italia,

Riccardo Di Iulio