Andrea Romano’s book “Batistuta, the last center forward” was released last week for the Unexpected Lives series of the 66THAND2D publishing house. The volume (256 pages, 18 euros) recounts the deeds of the Argentine gunner, his career, his mad (and reciprocated) love for Florence, the Scudetto with Roma as protagonists and that generosity that made him go beyond the limits of his body, and then pay the consequences. Here is an excerpt from the book, courtesy of the publisher.
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The relaxed atmosphere around the Super cup remains intact for a handful of seasons, passing unscathed even for the 5-1 with which in 1990 the Napoli blows out the “champagne football” of Juventus by Maifredi. To shatter the sloth of fans and the press, you have to wait until the summer of 1996, when the antagonism between Fiorentina and Milan seems to be able to really go from a low-budget soap opera to a big blockbuster. The plot is based on an inequality, on the nagging attempt to Cecchi Gori to cancel the distance with Berlusconi. To do this, Vittorio is forced to multiply the investmentsto inject capital. It means getting as close as possible to the sun, with the risk of realizing too late that your wax wings are melting. But this is a thought that does not even cross the president of the Viola. Cecchi Gori has the concrete possibility of parading a trophy a Your Broadcasting and get out of a competition between the two that until then existed more in his words than in deeds. It seems to be immersed in The Lady Of Lucio Dallawith Vittorio who speaking of Silvio could pronounce the verse: “He is a friend who has become an enemy who steals my voice”.
Florence is crossed by a shock electric. And a hitherto irrelevant trophy suddenly becomes a key to figuring out what to expect from the future. “The one between Cecchi Gori and Berlusconi was one political rivalry and entrepreneurial” he tells me Emiliano Bigica during a nice chat. “Vittorio kept repeating it to us all the time. Every time we played against Milan, he hammered us all over the place week leading up to the match. He set very high match prizes, he gave us important gifts. But if he felt this dualism with Berlusconi, for us it was a match that put a cup up for grabs, which showed that we could play with the better team of those years”. The night goes by quickly. This time without fear. Finally without ghosts. “Gabriel was on fire inside on the eve of every game – adds the midfielder viola who will come on in that match three minutes from the end – it was the same before the Super cup. Not only did he want to improve himself, but he also managed to convey this of his fixation to others, to level them up”.
The effects of group therapy led by Batistuta clearly manifest themselves on the evening of 25 August. The air of San Siro is heavy. For the humidity that soaks the shirts. For the smoke bombs that choke your breath. In the eleventh minute Sandro Cois remove the ball a Desailly and lunges forward at Gabriel. The ball cuts the field quickly, but when it goes down he puts the Argentine in the neck of a funnel. Batistuta is alone, right on the edge of the penalty area, with Franco Baresi to block his way and Paul Maldini stuck to his back. Most attackers would end up being dematerialized by two who currently make up exactly half of the strongest defense in the world. Gabriel instead transforms a right stop into a lob, a sombrero that overtakes Baresi sucking the talent out of his body in a fraction of a second. The Rossoneri six covers the ball moving towards leftonly that the Argentine strips it by accelerating on the right and finds himself alone in front of Sebastian Rossi. The goalkeeper is planted one meter before the goal line, with the legs wide apart and arms wide open. Gabriel strikes on the fly. It’s a dirty shot, with a right fielder. But he travels fast. Rossi partly dives and partly landslides to the ground, transforming himself into the “goalkeeper who fell in the last vain defence” described by Umberto Saba. And all he can do is pick up the ball at the back of the net. The goal is heavy, but above all exemplary. Because it encompasses all the characteristics which according to Bigica make Batistuta unique. “The peculiarity of Gabrielthe fact that differentiated him from all the other great attackers was his ability to attack space and to magnetize the ball” the midfielder tells me. “I don’t know how he did it, perhaps the sense of power he expressed always led him to shake off the opponent. And then every time he had the ball on his right foot he played dead. He was throwing some throw stones incredible. I’ve seen the ball follow unthinkable trajectories.”
The euphoria melts about ten minutes later when the intermittent genie of Dejan Savicevic decides to light up until it reaches a dazzling intensity. The fantasist it widens on the right and converges towards the center moving in one winding dance which sends Amoruso out of time first and then Schwarz. Immediately after the ten Rossoneri takes a couple of small steps and throws a sharp left foot that crashes against the base of the post and shoots behind Awning. The rest of the game is trench warfare between the will to win and the fear of losing. It goes on like this until seven minutes from the end, when the black shoe of Desailly he hits Batistuta’s ankles hard. There punishment it is central, but is twenty-five meters from the Rossi gate. Gabriel settles the ball and steps back a few yards. With his hands resting on his hips and the white shirt out purple shorts. When Treossi whistles, the Argentine advances quickly. He takes one step, two steps, three steps. Then he throws a right foot that flies over the goal barrier and glide onto the post opposite to the one covered by Rossi. Gabriel opens his arms and trotterella with a face stretched with wonder. After a few seconds she changes direction, she approaches the camera, blows a kiss and shouts three words into it: “Irina, I love you! Irina, I love you!”. It is a declaration of love that is made exultationsomething very close to the “private words spoken in public” of a poem by T.S. Eliot. The problem is that the recipient of the dedication does not notice anything. Irina is in the house of Marble Fort together with the children. And there is no there decoder to tune the television to Tele+.