Re: Serie A Thread - 2008/2009 Season
i have to admit it was quite a moving scene. the fans singing for kaka (from the afternoon to late night) on the street, right in front of his home. Kakà appearing at the window (it looked like the pope!) to show his gratitude, crying, holding his nr.22 shirt... jeez... it almost made me think about "Romeo and Giulietta"!
let me tell u a story.
during the '60s there was this young promising italian striker. he was born in '44 in a little village in the "deep north" of italy. he was bought by cagliari when he was 20.
The first impact with cagliari was very tough for him. he was the typical northern italian. Very quiet, polite, extremely shy and moderate. cagliari instead is the typical southern city. it's noisy, passionate and warm. no wonder this little kid didn't find himself at home there (a couple of years ago, in an interview, he said "
at the beginning i tought - good Lord what have i done!. what am i doing here".
well eventually the kid grew up, dropped his armour and opened his heart to cagliari people. he litterally fell in love with cagliari.
and he grew up also from a professional point of view, as he became a world class foward... actually more than this... he became the 2nd best striker in the world... just one step behind Pelè (pelè himself once admitted "
maybe i had a bit more technique than him, but he was a better overall foward")
he was serie a's cannoniere (top scorer) for 3 years in a row. and even though cagliari wasn't really a top club those days (it was a mid class team wich used to play some top class football..... pretty much as today's cagliari), he was able to lead his little team to the scudetto. with our national team he won the european championship in '68 and lost the world cup final against pele's brazil (arguably the best brazil team ever) in '70.
with italy's shirt he played 42 matches, scoring 35 goals (wich means a goal-per-matches ratio of 0.83!!!!).... no need to say it's italy's all time record.
so no wonder if the top clubs were looking for him. Juventus in '74 made a huge bid for him... the club just couldn't say "no" coz their star player became just too good to stay in cagliari.....
but surprisingly it was the lad himself the one who said "no". the bond with cagliari became just too strong, and he couldn't leave "his people" anymore.
that player was Gigi Riva (aka "rombo di tuono), the legendary foward, one of the greatest strikers of all times (the best one according to pele's words).
here in italy we usually call players like Riva "bandiere".
Bandiera (bandiere is the plural) means "flag". it's a metaphorical expression we use when we refer to those players who became icons for their class and their loyalty to their clubs. we use the word Bandiera to refer to the club's emblem (the italian proper translation of emblem would be "stemma", but we rather use the word bandiera). so, in a metaphorical sense, we say that those players had such a strong bond with the team, the fans, the city, they became the ideal representation of the team itself, like an emblem, a flag, a "bandiera".
till 30 years ago there were many "bandiere" around europe... today just a few clubs in the world have a real bandiera. scholes (man utd), gerrard (liverpool), raul (real madrid), del piero (juve), maldini (milan), zanetti (inter).
however some might say it's pretty easy to be a top class club's bandiera. afterall, playing in a top class club u already got access to the european competitions, u earn quite a lot of money, u have your good chances to win trophies.
so just a few bandiere have a chance to really show, to prove their loyalty through their carreers. Del piero went in serie b, rather than accepting the rich offers that other top clubs (inside and outside italy) made for him. even tough he had absolutely no responsailities, no faults at all, he payed (together with juve) for what other people did. but while juve had no other choice than "paying" (with the serie b), del piero could have easily choosen a different path (as many others did), and no one would have blamed him. but still he said "
the captain doesn't leave the boat when it's sinking".
totti and de rossi had a chance to prove their loyalty too, when they refused milan (totti) and real madrid (de rossi and totti) offers.
i think now we can put kaka in the same list.
i still don't know if that was the best option for milan (unlike most of the top clubs outside italy, milan has a very little overdraft and with just 60 of those 100 millions milan would have payed all his debts), but i have to admit, it was moving .
besides the only thing that really matters is the milanisti's opinion and they seem to be extremely confident this was the best thing for milan, so, i can just be happy for them.
one thing is for sure however. after hearing what kakà said yesterday, i guess it's pretty evident he'll never leave milan... unless galliani and berlusconi will kick him out.... and now that both galliani and berlusconi have seen how the fans would react to such a thing.... i don't think they'll ever accept an offer for kakà, no matter how big it is.
anyhow guys, kaka did definitely something important. with his refusal, he proved that sometimes money is not the most important thing in football's world.... and this is good.
but still i wouldn't consider this arabian lad as some sort of a devil. sure i don't like this attitude. sure i don't think this is a the most proper way to build a team.... but afterall what he's trying to do is not different from what abramovich did a few years ago.
oh and there's one more thing we realised from this story. Deep in the milanesi soul, there's a napoletano's heart
Zeem said:
If Milan want money, then sell Ronaldinho, Borriello, Gourccuf, even Pirlo I don't care
i guess we will all pretend we didn't read this part Zeem
edit: i just read Gerd's post, wich, as usual, perfectly reflects my personal opinion about man city's strategies.
What is?!
Kaka obviously knew a move there would jeperdize his real dream move 
