“The Beautiful Antonio” Antonio Cabrini
Cabrini is considered as the greatest full-back of the world during 1980s. Because of his popularity as a fascinating and good-looking football player, On the field, his technical and physical qualities made of him the most popular defender of the history of Italian football. Cabrini was almost a completed side-back, showing his world-class defensive and offensive quality but his right-foot was the only disadvantage that it was not rather useful in some occasions. But still, His left-foot was good enough to create many goals for his team especially scored 9 goals for Italy is the all-time record for Italian defender. He was one of the main players of Juventus in their glory era which was the most successful team in Italy. He was voted from
www.channel4.com as a starter in Juventus all-time XI. Cabrini was voted in 13th and 14th Ballon'Dor in 1978 and 1983, respectively.
"The Divine Ponytail" Roberto Baggio
(credit to
antohan Joga)
The
dribbling ability, technique and vision he possessed bordered on obscene and were outrageous to say the least. Baggio was an artist on the pitch and had the ruthless efficiency to go with it. He was equally at home racking up assists and
slotting the ball in the net. In the 452 Serie A matches he played, he scored 205 goals and 118 assists which is exceptional for a Second Striker/Playmaker. Of the 205 goals 96 were decisive, meaning that they were either equalisers or match winners. He also scored the most goals for Italy in the World Cup as well and is the only Italian to score in 3 WCs.
Baggio dragged Italy to the 1994 final. He scored the last-minute equaliser against Nigeria in the last-16, the late quarter-final winner against Spain and then tore Bulgaria apart in the semi-finals. In terms of match-winning influence in latter-stage games, there have been very few players who have matched Baggio’s in that World Cup. It remains one of the competition’s great individual displays, pity about the peno.
Roberto Baggio is considered one of Italy's greatest and most beloved players of all time.
Gianni Brera, a famous Italian sports writer who had seen both the Italian Legends
Giuseppe Meazza and
Gianni Rivera play, stated that Baggio was the best and most talented Italian player he had ever seen.
Lotthar Matthäus
Named European Footballer of the Year and World Soccer Player of the Year after captaining West Germany to victory in the 1990 FIFA World Cup. One year later, he was also named the first ever FIFA World Player of the Year, and remains the only German to do so.
He has played in five FIFA World Cups (1982, 1986, 1990, 1994, 1998) more than any other outfield player, and holds the record for the most World Cup matches played by a single player (25 games). He also won UEFA Euro 1980 and is the most capped German player of all time, retiring with a total of 150 appearances (83 for West Germany) in 20 years, and 23 goals for the German national team. Diego Maradona said about Matthäus "he is the best rival I've ever had. I guess that's enough to define him" in his book Yo soy el Diego (I am Diego). A versatile and complete player, Matthäus was renowned for his perceptive passing, positional sense, and well-timed tackling, as well as his explosive shot. During his career, he usually played as a box-to-box midfielder, although later in his career he played as a sweeper.
Jurgen Kohler
One of the greatest defenders of all time and easily the stand-out man-marker of the modern era. During a decorated career where he shone at all levels, it was under Trapattoni at Juventus he had the second-highest average rating of any Serie A player in 1991/92.
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