I Think Therefore I Play by Andrea Pirlo, Alessandro Alciato Read Free Book Online

something else and managed to enjoy himself.
    He held up pretty well until a few days before the semi-final against Germany in Dortmund. In training, he’d undergone a fitness test to see how he was. If he’d really healed, there was a definite possibility he could get back out on the pitch. At a certain point he raised his leg just a little, and was instantly struck by the terrible realisation that something had gone.
    He was dying inside and we weren’t much better, having seen the effort he’d put into sustaining a hope that was now extinguished. He managed to hold it together in front of Lippi and the rest of the squad, but back in his room it was a different story. I’m not sure anyone has ever cried as many tears all in one go. He didn’t want people seeing him like that, and, knowing him as I do, I believe it took a superhuman effort to avoid the collapse taking place in public.
    When a dream dies like that, there’s no way of striking back. You take the punch and suffer the consequences. Physical ones, yes, but more than anything they’re psychological.
    Daniele wasn’t having a much better time of it. Everyone remembers the elbow on Brian McBride in the game against the United States. 13 What the fans don’t know (apart from a few guilty ones) is that in camp, my team-mate started to receive menacing letters, insults and threats against his family. There were some awful things directed at his parents, two absolute diamonds.
    Every day there was post for him. The postman always rings twice, but if we were expecting to see Maria De Filippi 14 on the doorstep, it turned out to be Hannibal Lecter, standing there with poison pen letters in his hand. Daniele took it all really badly. I remember long periods, whole days in fact, when he didn’t want to see another soul. Anyone who knows him will tell you he’s got a massive heart, something that actually makes things worse when you’re in such a bad place.
    Sometimes he’d come up to us and whisper: “Sandro, Andrea, how’s it going?” A banal little question thrown out there to let us know that he was going mad; that his desire to unburden himself was heading off the scale.
    A four-match ban is long enough under normal circumstances. When you’re playing a World Cup, it’s a prison sentence. You realise you’re running the risk of never getting out of there.
    We, his team-mates, weren’t exactly the most tactful to begin with. “Daniele, what the fuck have you done?” we asked him. We knew we were losing one of our most important assets. Almost immediately, though, friendship got the upper hand. Mates are there to be cared for, not questioned. You love them regardless.
    The letters didn’t stop arriving, but they polluted things less and less. De Rossi came back and scored a penalty in the final, a nice reply with return receipt to all those classless scribblers. Judging by the spelling and grammar mistakes that cropped up in between the insults, they lacked intellect as well as dignity.
    I was happy to help Daniele, and now it’s his turn to have my back on the pitch as well. Every time I see him, I tell him the same thing. “Dero, I’m going to retire from international football after the 2014 World Cup. And I want to play in the final again.”
    It’s a pity that Sandrino can’t be there. He got off at Ausfahrt.
     
    11. Ultras are the self-styled most passionate, vocal and committed supporters of a team. Although the term can have negative connotations, it is not synonymous with ‘hooligans’
    12. A leading figure on the Italian rock/pop scene in the 1970s and ’80s. Died in 1998, but his songs remain popular
    13. After beating Ghana 2–0 in their opening group fixture (with Pirlo scoring and being named Man of the Match), Italy took the lead against USA through Alberto Gilardino. A Cristian Zaccardo own goal saw the States draw level, before De Rossi was sent off for crudely elbowing striker Brian McBride in the face (and drawing blood)