An old interview from Giorgio but very interesting anyway.
The bianconero player and his life beyond football: college, Turin, his friends
Chiellini, confessions of a central back
Giorgio Chiellini, can you convince us that there are players that actually think?
“We aren’t that rare, really”
But you seem a 'secchione’ (an A student that passes his life on books.. a geek in short), don’t you?
“Well, I’m absolutely not a 'secchione’, but I always liked school and I swear that no one of the team has ever made fun of me because of this”.
Can you tell us about your curriculum vitae, please?
“Five years of hard work at the scientific high school. Now I’m majoring in business, but, obviously I had to slow down. Now my job has to come first, even if it’s difficult for me to consider football, my passion, a job”.
You still bring your books on the pre-match retires?
“I have to. I started as a boy, because when I was 16-17 years old I already played regularly in the Livorno’s first team: it happened that I had a school test on monday morning and I couldn’t afford a week-end of pure relax. Now it’s gotten easier, even though it saddens me a bit that I can’t go to classes. Fortunately I moved to the Torino University, when I studied in Pisa it was a bit more complicated/uncomfortable”
Why did you choose business as a major?“First of all because I always loved maths, then because the world of finances, of trade, fascinates me”.
So there’s no chance you’ll waste the fortunes you’re gaining?“It’s just two or three years that I’m gaining what can be considered fortunes. Anyway I’m not ready yet to reach a perfect way of making business. To start I invested in estates: I bought a house in Livorno and I’m currently looking for a good occasion in Turin”.
And how is you 'libretto universitario’ (a document where the exams passed are registered)?“I passed 3 exams and I’m preparing 2. In a couple of weeks I’ll have the e-commerce one, that shouldn’t be too hard for me, since I know the internet world very well. Then I have statistics: a bit hard, but it’s something I like”.
Is Chiellini an alien?“Are you crazy? I’m just a guy that always thought that living of only football wasn’t possible, also because it’s just a couple of years that I’m certain that I’ll have a career in football. But in any other way I’m like any other player: I’m a videogames maniac and, most of all, I’m a football fanatic”.
And this means..?
“It means that I watch and read anything related with football, from Serie A to Serie C, to the European championships. On Mondays I read all the match statistics, I know the formations by heart. And if I find names of players I don’t know, I always try to get information. It’s something I’ve always done, since I was a kid, together with my twin Claudio, who plays in the dilettantes championship”.
Another Chiellini?“I’ve been a bit luckier than him. What’s curious is that he has always been a CB and they are now making him play as LB, exactly when I’m becoming a CB: but Claudio always told me to change role”.
Other passions?“Electronics, of any kind. I surf a lot the internet. I’m working to make my home become as much hi-tech as possible. Some people are afraid of modernity, but I’m not. On the contrary I think it’s an extraordinary resource. I believe a lot in science”.
Chiellini are you a rational person?
“Yeah, I’m very rational”.
It’s not what one would think after seeing you play, you know?
“I know. Even my mom tells me that sometimes I don’t look like me, cause of my eyes: on the field I’m incredibly impulsive, I bring out everything I have inside, I can’t control myself, I’m all strength and runs and little brain. But playing as CB, for example, I have to be more rational: maybe this role will be able to make the two ends of my personality meet.”
Why do people think of football players as ignorant and superficial?“Because many are exactly like this, I can’t deny it, even though they aren’t the majority. The fact is that our environment helps to make people remain superficial: at 18 years old one has everything, can do anything and it happens that these guys enter in the adult world without any kind of other worries in their mind. A lot depends on the type of people one frequents”.
What about your circle of friends?“My friends in Livorno, the ones that have been my friends forever. I haven’t been able to find new ones in Turin, because our environment is a bit closed and, in the end, we all frequent people that are part of the same world”.
Also some 'interested’ friend?“It happens that there are people that want to become your friends just because you play for Juventus, but I think that it’s easy to see the difference between true and false friends. It gets much more difficult with women”.
Which are your ambitions?
“What’s important for me is feeling in place where I am. I mean: I prefer an environment that appreciates me, rather than leaving to play the Champions Legaue. Living comes first”.
And how is living in Turin?“It’s good: it’s a balanced city, hence perfect for me, since I care a lot about balance. It may seem stupid, but at the beginning I missed the sea a lot and the way sea people live, even though sometimes it arrives to intrude on the privacy of people”.
And, besides Turin, where do you imagine yourself?“An old idea of mine, since when I was very young, is Rome. And then England, for both the lifestyle of its people and of their way of living their football passion: the English spirit drives me crazy”.
And the Italian one?
“If you mean this summer’s scandals, I have to say they changed my way of seeing things”.
What do you mean?
“I mean that it was sickening, they did everything quickly and casually. I’m convinced that it came out only what was indispensable to bring Moggi down”.
Why do you think so?“Because I think that what Guido Rossi did is unacceptable. It would have been enough reading his curriculum vitae to understand it: an incredible conflict of interests, it’s like they called Galliani to judge Milan. In fact, as soon as he could, he went back to Telecom. By doing so, he erased any doubt I still may have had about him”.
And how did Chiellini’s way of living change?“Before I played with more unease, anxiety. Now I’m more calm. What happened made me grow”.
What will Chiellini do of his life?
“I’m studying, but I have too much football in my head. Every morning, when I wake up, I can’t wait to play. Now that I’m injuried I’m going crazy”.
About that, when are you going to return?
“In two weeks, against Vicenza”.
And you know the formation?
“Vicenza’s? By heart, of course”.