Where to start if he’s really stopping now? There are a few possibilities. For example, with all the trophies he has won during his long and remarkable football career: nine championships, seven of them in a row, a Uefa Cup as a youngster, plus of course the most important of all titles, the 2006 World Cup in Germany. Only in the Champions League has he never triumphed. A flaw, for sure. He was world goalkeeper five times, and to this day he is the record player for his country, 40 games ahead of second-placed. He once managed 974 minutes without conceding, a record in Italy’s Serie A to this day. The runner-up in this category: himself, of course.
Italians are not exactly shy when it comes to nicknames for their heroes on the soccer field, but they generally have little use for Anglicisms. In this particular case, they made an exception for the sake of semantic precision: Superman, that’s what Gianluigi Buffon was also called, but he preferred to just be Gigi.
In any case, this Gigi, you can hardly believe it, actually stops playing football: at the age of 45, after almost three decades as a total work of art between the posts. And if the initial question was about where an appreciation of this career must begin, then the focus should first be on where it ends: in Parma, where Buffon started catching balls professionally. His advisor is currently negotiating the termination of the contract, which runs until 2024.
Buffon broke records, but he wasn’t an obsessive record hunter
Back then, in the mid-nineties, those were still glorious times in Calcio and at the club from Emilia-Romagna: Buffon was the foundation of a Parma team that is still legendary today, coached by offensive thinker Alberto Malesani. And now, on the last few meters of his career, Buffon again guarded the Gialloblu goal: the club had gone through bankruptcy in the meantime and only played in Serie B, Italy’s second division. But Buffon was no longer about glory, he gave up a few petrodollars in the well-known pensioners’ leagues. That, too, is typical: Buffon, born in Carrara on the Tuscan coast, was always attached to his homeland – even when it was “only” about his adopted homeland.
And although he broke quite a few records, he was never an obsessive record hunter. Buffon was ambitious and disciplined, of course, nobody else lasts that long at this level. He did not allow himself to be consumed by ambition.
The Italian sports gazettes, whose front pages Buffon graced countless times, in all the jubilant poses and contortions, reported on his decision even before he announced it himself. Buffon caught up on Wednesday with a highlight video on Instagram and a short farewell statement: “That’s it, guys! You gave me everything, I gave you everything. We made it together.”
Buffon had and has a special relationship with Juventus Turin, the Italian record champions, with whom Buffon experienced his best years. In 2001 he was hired by the Old Lady, who was the most expensive goalkeeper in the world at the time, costing an incredible 50 million euros. No small thing today either. Of course he had number one claims, but he would have preferred to have had the 77 on his shirt – his old shirt number at Parma. At Juve, he was told clearly and unequivocally, there are “no extra sausages”, but historical responsibility: Legends like Giampiero Combi and Dino Zoff had previously worn number one, which would now also be expected from Buffon.
At Juve, he quickly learned that nobody is bigger than the club. This feeds their DNA vincente, their winning mentality. On the other hand, how could Buffon have avoided that? After all, he learned from Marcello Lippi and Fabio Capello, two successful old-school coaches who are also known in Italy as “Sergeant” and “Feldmaresciallo”. Lippi was also his superior when Buffon lifted the World Cup trophy into the Berlin night sky in 2006. For him that was the day of days: Gigi became Gigi Nazionale. And shortly thereafter a second division keeper. Juve was sentenced to relegation for referee manipulation, but Buffon remained loyal to the club.
Buffon has no enemies – and that’s saying something in Italy
He was a keeper of traditional build, endowed with the reflexes of a big cat, a fuoriclasse on the line. That’s what they call their top performers in Italy, but he was also valuable as an authority. Buffon also had his status because he never hid his weaknesses, he addressed his depression and his (legal) gambling addiction. Something else is considered his biggest misstep: In Parma, the plump youngster would have liked to have had the double zero on his shirt as a symbol for his “two eggs”. After this request was rejected, he claimed the 88 for himself – just four eggs.
Stupidly, but also a right-wing cipher: The H is the eighth letter of the alphabet, with the 88 the phrase “Heil Hitler” is encoded. Gigi the fascist? This accusation had accompanied him for a long time, but the story is now regarded primarily as colossal stupidity. In any case, Buffon would never have attracted attention again as a political head. Now that he has announced his departure from professional business, it can be said anyway: Buffon no longer has any opponents. And that’s saying something in a polarized football country like Italy.
