Reasons to Love Italian Football
Thursday, May 26, 2011
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Alessandro Del Piero - that's it. What do you mean that's not enough? Ok, fine. Maldini, Totti (the most aptly named footballer ever), Cannavaro....need I go on. Ok, so none of these are actually the reason I fell in love with Italian football, but they sure help.
The summer I fell in love was the summer that Baggio completed his controversial move to Juventus, and so my love affair with Juve was born. Supporting Juve seemed easy; the 90s and early 00s was full of success and big name signings. Footballing greats such as Zidane, Inzaghi, Nedved, and Buffon all contributing to Juve being one of the best teams in the world.
Until it seemingly all fell apart in 2006. This was the point when Del Piero and Nedved proved just how much they had deserved my love over the years. During Euro '96 our den was even named 'The Ned' in tribute to the great Pavel Nedved (and because we thought we were kind of cool). They didn't need to stay; could quite easily have bailed like most of the others, but they didn't. They stayed and vowed to bring Juve back to top flight where they belonged.
There's some way to go to recapture the brilliance and quality of the mid to late 90s, but they'll get there, and Del Piero will probably still be top goalscorer.
Nedved was awesome