Gianluca Vialli: how he became Italy’s “charm” in the tournament that gave him the last great footballing joy

During his two-decade professional career, Gianluca Viallidied this Friday at his home in London at the age of 58 from pancreatic cancer, he has stroked almost all the most important trophies a footballer can aspire to and had a successful spell with the Italy national team. Already retired, he was considered a charm for his friend, Roberto Mancini, with whom he won the Euro Cup last year at Wembley.

Vialli was born on July 9, 1964 in Villa Affaitati, on the outskirts of Cremona, in Lombardy. He began his successful career throughout the city, the Cremonese: there he made his debut on May 10, 1981, still aged 16, in a match his team drew 0-0 with Parma as hosts for the 30th round of Serie C1.

La Cremonese was his first great love. In fact, the last and unexpected visit to the stadium was to Giovanni Zini in his hometown on 4 September, to watch the 2-0 victory over Sassuolo. And in the Curva Sud del Zini, a banner saying “Luca Vialli, convert for us”. He played there for four years, in which he played 107 matches, scored 23 goals and achieved two promotions which brought the team back grey-red in Serie A after more than half a century. After the last one, the striker was sold to Sampdoria.

In Genoa he hatched his second great love story. “One of Ours”the club defined it in a very emotional letter published shortly after the news of the ex-striker’s death. “You came boy, we salute you man. We will remember you as a child and relentless attacker, because the heroes are all young and beautiful. And you, since that summer of 1984, were our hero. Strong and beautiful, with that 9 stamped on the back and the tricolor stitched on the heart. You gave us so much, we gave you so much: yes, it was love, reciprocal, infinite.the club added in its farewell.

Its eight years old sample coincided with the most glorious period in the club’s history, in which it captured not only its only Serie A title (in the 1990/91 season) and its only international trophy (the Cup Winners’ Cup in 1989/90), but he has also lifted the Italian Cup three times and that country’s Super Cup once. In addition to his 328 caps and 141 goals, he has made some of the most enduring friendships football has given him. between them, with Robert Mancini. Perhaps the most painful thorn of that period was the final of the European Champions Cup Lost to Barcelona at Wembley in 1992.

That trophy that escaped him with Sampdoria he obtained four years later as captain Juventus, the club he had joined immediately after the final loss against Barça. Infallible as always, in the Old lady He scored 38 goals in 102 matches and enriched his winning curriculum: in addition to the Champions League, he won his second Scudetto, an Italian Cup, another Supecopa and a UEFA Cup.

With all those joys on your back, moved to England to play for Chelsea the last three seasons of his career. There he did something extremely rare at the gates of the 21st century: he has combined the duties of player and manager since February 1998, after Dutchman Ruud Gullit was fired. In that dual role he won the FA Cup, the English League Cup, another Cup Winners’ Cup and a European Super Cup.

mid 1999 he decided to quit playing to concentrate solely on his job as manager of Chelsea. Despite winning two other titles (the FA Cup and the Charity Shield), making him the most successful manager in the history of Blues, he was fired in September 2000, just a month before the start of the season, due to differences with some big shots in the squad, including his compatriot Gianfranco Zola. Subsequently, his tour as DT only included a spell at Watford in the 2001/02 season.

Vialli’s years at Sampdoria, the most brilliant of his career, also coincide with the shirt of the Italian national team. After a brilliant career in the Under 21s when he was still playing for Cremonese (11 goals in 21 games), Enzo Bearzot made him his major debut on November 16, 1985, just 21 years old, in a friendly match against Poland. With the Blueswith which he totaled 59 matches and scored 16 goals, he participated in the World Cups in Mexico 1986 and Italy 1990, and in the German federal Eurocup 1988.

His bond with the national team was renewed almost thirty years after his last match in the blue shirt (it was on December 19, 1992 in the 2-1 victory against Malta, in which he scored a goal). After entering the Italian Football Hall of Fame in 2015 and being named ambassador for Euro 2020 by the Italian Football Federation (FIGC), in November 2019 enters as head of delegation of the team led by his friend Mancini.

by then previously lived with pancreatic cancer which had been detected in 2017 and for which he underwent surgery, a first cycle of nine-month chemotherapy and a second cycle of eight months which had a very strong impact on his body. After that, Vialli revealed that he was wearing a sweater under his shirt at the time not to look too thin.

In 2020, he was informed that there were no more signs of the disease in his body. “She was very tough, even for a tough guy like me. I’m happy, even if I say it softly. It may seem strange, but now I feel luckier than many” he said later. This improvement allowed him to be part of the team delegation in 2021 that won the Euro after 52 years.

During that tournament he was the stellar protagonist of a ritual born of an error and which became a cabala for the Italians. Before the match of the second round of the tournament against Switzerland, the bus carrying the delegation left from the concentration camp headed for the Stadio Olimpico in Rome without Vialli on board and had to return to pick him up. Since then, the former striker has been the last one on the bus whenever the team travels.

That tournament represented the last great joy that football gave him.. The image of his embrace with Mancini after the victory on penalties against England in the final played at Wembley has become a modern postcard of Italian sport.

In December 2021, during the book launch “Gianluca inflates the net” (“Gianluca inflates the net”), by journalist Matteo Bonetti, the former player announced that he is undergoing a new treatment for cancer. “I am quite well. I haven’t completed the trip yet and the unwanted guest is always there. Sometimes more present, sometimes less. Let’s say they are under maintenance now. This continues and I hope they can put up with me for many years,” she enthused .

In September 2020, a few days after his last visit to the Cremonese stadium, posted a photo on his Instagram account with Mancini and Gabriel Batistuta. On 14 December, he reported that he was temporarily stepping down from his position as head of the team delegation to focus on dealing with his wife Cathryn (whom he had met in London when she played for Chelsea) and their daughters, Olivia. and Sofia.

“I think I have less time to be a good example now that I know I won’t die old. That’s why I wonder if I’m setting a good example for my daughters.”, Vialli explained in 2021 in a conversation with the conductor Alessandro Cattelan inserted in a chapter of the documentary series “A simple question”. And he explained: “I try to teach them that happiness depends on the expectations you have in life. I try to teach them not to be vain or arrogant, to listen more and talk less, to be better people every day, to laugh more and to help others. For me this is the secret of happiness”.