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Thu 31 March 2022 | 16:30

Top facts about Angelo Di Livio, toy soldier

Angelo Di Livio was a dynamic and versatile midfielder who won numerous awards all at Juventus. With Italy, he was involved in two European Championships and the same number of World Cups. Read on to find out more facts about Angelo Di Livio, Juventus legend.

Angelo Di Livio Cavaliere OMRI (born July 26, 1966) is a retired Italian football midfielder and defender. Throughout his career, he played for a number of Italian teams in Serie A, but rose to fame with Juventus, where he gained several domestic & global trophies.

Angelo Di Livio’s age

is 55. Here you can find out the most important facts about Angelo Di Livio, the defensive central midfielder.

At the international level, he represented Italy in two FIFA World Cups and two UEFA European Championships, getting to the final of UEFA Euro 2000.

Di Livio joined Juventus in 1993 and made his Serie A debut on September 5, 1993, against his youth club

Roma

. He remained in Turin for the next six years, becoming a fixture on the right wing.

Di Livio won the Scudetto three times with the Turin team, the Coppa Italia once, the Italian Super Cup twice, the Champions League, the UEFA Super Cup once, and the World Cup once under Marcello Lippi.

Angelo Di Livio made his Squadra Azzurra debut against Slovenia on September 6, 1995, under Arrigo Sacchi. He joined

Fiorentina

in 1999 and won the Coppa Italia with the club and coach Roberto Mancini in 2000/01.

When the club was renamed ACF Florence after being relegated to Serie C2 in 2002, he became a legend among the fans. He decided to extend his career after being promoted back to Serie A in 2003/04.

Fiorentina battled relegation last season, and Di Livio was frequently on the bench. However, in the final and decisive match against Brescia Calcio, which Florence won 3-0, he played from the start and received a minute-long ovation from the Florentine fans after being substituted a few minutes before the end.

Top facts about Angelo Di Livio:

An important fact about Angelo Di Livio is that he became known as "Soldatino" (little soldier) over the years, a nickname given to him by

Roberto Baggio

for his tireless efforts.

After finishing his playing career, Di Livio worked as a youth coach at Roma and as a member of Marcello Lippi's coaching staff at the Italian national team, among other things.

Angelo Di Livio early life

Di Livio, who was born in Rome, started his professional career with Roma in 1984.

Regarding

Angelo Di Livio’s childhood

, it is worth mentioning that at the age of fifteen he joined the Roma youth academy with which he won the Viareggio Tournament in 1983 and the following year the Primavera Championship. There is no information available about

Angelo Di Livio’s parents

.

Angelo Di Livio personal life

A notable fact about Angelo Di Livio is that he has two kids, one of which is a footballer named Lorenzo. Lorenzo was a Roma youth product and presently plays for Catanzaro.

Di Livio has maintained his public impact and excellent image as one of the most popular players of his time. Angelo Di Livio was selected "Brand ambassador" for SKS365's planetwin365 brand in 2011.

Angelo Di Livio professional career

During his playing career, he was nicknamed as soldatino (toy soldier) or soldatino Di Livio, a title given to him by Roberto Baggio, his Juventus teammate at the time, because of Di Livio's distinctive technique of racing up and down the wing.

An important fact about Angelo Di Livio is that he began his career at AS Roma, where he progressed through all of the youth teams before making his Serie A debut.

In 1985, he moved to Serie C1, where he spent the next two years with AC Reggiana and AG Nocerina. In 1987, he moved to Perugia, which he left in October 1989 to join Calcio Padova in Serie B.

Angelo Di Livio club career

A notable fact about Angelo Di Livio is that he played for Reggiana (1985–86), Nocerina (1986–87), Perugia (1987–89), Padova (1989–93),

Juventus

(1993–99), and Fiorentina (1999–2005) after failing to make an appearance in his lone season with the club.

Juventus

From 1993 until 1999, he was a key member of Juventus' dominating starting lineup, playing in one of the most successful eras in the club's history.

He won three scudetti (Italian A League) and one Champions League championship (1996) with Juventus, as well as two Italian Supercups (1995, 1997), a Coppa Italia, a UEFA Supercup (1996), and an Intercontinental Cup (1996), and he reached the final of the 1994–95 UEFA Cup.

Fiorentina

A notable

fact about Angelo Di Livio

is that he went to Fiorentina in 1999, where he led the squad that won the Coppa Italia in 2000–01. When AC Fiorentina went bankrupt in 2002 and was reborn as Florentia Viola in Serie C2, Di Livio demonstrated his commitment by being the only player to remain with the team, playing through the depths of Italian football on the way back to Serie A in 2004, eventually retiring after the 2004–05 Serie A season.

Di Livio served as a coach in the A.S. Roma Youth System after retirement (Allievi "Coppa Lazio").

Angelo Di Livio international career

For Italy, Di Livio was capped 40 times. He represented Italy in Euro 96, the FIFA World Cup in 1998, Euro 2000 (when Italy finished second), and the FIFA World Cup in 2002. His first cap was against

Slovenia

on September 6, 1995, and his last was against South Korea on June 18, 2002.

In the team's 2–1 triumph against Russia in the first group match at Euro 1996, he set up Pierluigi Casiraghi's first goal. He was often deployed as a holding player for Italy, shutting down games when the side was ahead and so clinching the victory.

Angelo Di Livio style of play

Di Livio was a quick, experienced, energetic, combative, reliable, and tactically versatile player who was usually deployed on the right wing, but he could also play on the left flank, as a wide midfielder, or as a full-back or wing-back; he could also play in the middle, as a box-to-box or defensive midfielder, or even in defense.

A notable fact about Angelo Di Livio is that he was recognized for his speed, stamina, work-rate, strength, persistence, mindset, man-marking skills, and crossing accuracy, as well as his ability to make aggressive runs down the side while simultaneously tracking back, which allowed him to cover the wing successfully and have a successful career.

Angelo Di Livio and the best Juve era

The majority of football fans understand what it's like to never win. It's a fact to which they've become used through the years and decades. Not winning is an important aspect of the perennial grimness that is fandom, the constant unmet promise, for this disgruntled majority. Juventus supporters are unique.

The Bianconeri are so dominating, with such a large prize collection, that those supporters who grew up without seeing them win several trophies are a true rarity.

Angelo Di Livio, the first player to wear the No.7 jersey for Juventus regardless of position, was born on July 26, 1966, in the Italian capital city of Rome. He began his career in the Rome youth system before joining Reggiana during the 1985-86 season after failing to make the first team in his only season with AS Roma.

The midfielder went on the move once again, joining Nocerina in 1986-87 and then Perugia in 1987-88, before moving on to Padova in 1989-90 following two seasons with Perugia.

Before joining the Turin giants in the 1993/94 season, the Italian midfielder found some stability at Padova, where he made over 100 appearances in nearly four years.

Midfielder Roberto Baggio came to fame in Turin, where he was part of a well-drilled squad that included Roberto Vialli, Antonio Conte, and subsequently Zinedine Zidane and Lilian Thuram.

Marcello Lippi, the future Italian World Cup-winning manager, took use of the Juventus no7's flexibility by using him as a defensive midfielder, fullback, left midfielder, and, most importantly, as a right midfielder.

Juventus has been the dominant power in Italian football for long periods of time. They were the first and only team in history to win five Scudetti in a row.

They have by far the most league championships (34), outnumbering everyone else. Their persistent domestic infallibility makes it acceptable to consider splitting calcio's traditional big three into two tiers: them,

AC Milan

, and Internazionale.

While Juventus supporters are a colorful and varied bunch that span Italy's geographical boundaries and beyond, the way the rest of the world sees the club, the non-supporters, is very different.

To the untrained eye, Juventus seems to be a coldly robotic, unstoppable, monolithically successful club, devoid of the romanticism that comes with losing and, therefore, hoping. Juventus is a team that is eager, demanding, and, in the end, successful.

Even yet, this Turinese behemoth hasn't always shied away from loss. In fact, from the mid-1980s and the mid-1990s, the club went a decade without winning a single trophy.

They didn't win for eight years, and their hold on power weakened as Milan, led by the creative Arrigo Sacchi and the observant Fabio Capello, threatened to overtake them at the top. "You'll know what it takes to win when you learn to lose," Journey famously sang.

Cheesy? Absolutely. However, for Juventini, who grew up in the 1980s and 1990s, such sentiments may ring true. Because their football worldview was suddenly shattered at this time.

After two decades of unrelenting success, they learnt to lose. As their team faced its longest spell of prolonged futility since the 1940s, they grew familiar with the harsh reality of this beautiful game.

Marcello Lippi had been watching the whole thing unfold. He had watched the demise of a sports icon, and in the summer of 1994, he would respond to the frightened call of Juventus president Vittorio Chiusano.

Chiusano, who was born in Turin, has been connected with the club since the 1960s, first as a board member, then as vice president.

He rose through the ranks of the club to become president in February 1990, and he went about restoring the dignity of his beloved, injured Vecchia Signora. He'd accomplish it mostly via the signatures of trustworthy people.

He rehired Giovanni Trapattoni, a coach who had won six of a potential ten titles during his previous stint in charge, and assembled an outstanding on-paper squad.

He signed Italian legends Roberto Baggio and Gianluca Vialli, as well as English international David Platt and German players Jürgen Kohler and Andreas Möller, twice breaking the global transfer record. Angelo Peruzzi, Massimo Carrera, Angelo Di Livio,

Antonio Conte

, and Fabrizio Ravanelli, among the less flashy newcomers, gave the team a major quality boost. However, the Scudetto remained elusive.

The Italian was a relentless winger who was one of the game's most technically brilliant and disciplined players. Due to the manner he obeyed the manager's directions, he was dubbed the Il Solidatino or the little soldier by his more respected colleague Roberto Baggio.

The Italian was a manager's player who flourished under strict coaches like Marcelo Lippi and Giovani Trappatoni. He was recognized for his speed, mentality, man-marking, crossing, strength, work-rate, consistency, and adaptability, among other things.

Trapattoni quit the club after three seasons without playing amid increasing pressure. Lippi took his position. The only choice was to succeed, and so the Juventus comeback started.

Lippi gave Italian football a new look — not on the field, but in the stands. Juve's new coach, in contrast to Milan's hard, glowering features, was a rugged good-looking guy. He was cool personified, with his silver-white hair, fondness for smokes, and fine fashion sense.

Lippi was a passionate football player, apart from his propensity to reduce respected colleagues to cold showers.

His tolerant demeanor, beautiful formative memories of playing on the beach in his hometown of Viareggio, small playing career, and sequence of survival missions in early coaching ventures all belied a merciless leader. Regardless matter what his CV indicated, he had a winning attitude. He was the ideal player for Juventus.

Lippi was engaged in teaching from the minute his playing days came to an end, committed to his discipline. He started with Sampdoria's minor teams and worked his way through Italy's lower levels, all the while looking for ways to develop himself.

He was shamelessly little more than a coach, like many of those who graduated from Coverciano's school, with a pronounced distaste for the transfer market and its rising prominence in the 1990s.

If his employers bought him a player, he took full responsibility for his development, regardless of the player's quality or suitability. While he worked relentlessly to establish teams, he was also not hesitant to speak out when he believed it was necessary.

Lippi has a reputation for keeping close contact with his players. This was not a problem for the vast majority of people. However, for other people, the coach's closeness was a problem.

And when Lippi's relationship with one of his players deteriorated, it didn't always improve. He would disobey some of the world's best players on several occasions, all on the solid belief that if it didn't fit the team, it didn't suit him.

Christian Vieri was another player who had to deal with the less digestible side of Lippi's openness in leading his squad, but unlike Baggio, he came out on top.

Vieri, although being a tall, muscular, single-minded, and deadly finisher, was vulnerable to criticism. And, when Juventus drew 0-0 at halftime in an away game against

Atalanta

during the 1996/97 season, the striker, enraged by negative criticism, almost fought his coach in the changing room, only to be removed by teammates.

Vieri would sit on the bench for a few weeks before returning to the starting lineup. And, while he was sold after only a year in black and white, it had nothing to do with his relationship with Lippi, as the two reconciled after their fight and later became friends. Vieri was instead allowed to leave because the financial benefits of selling him outweighed the need to keep him.

Some coaches would have struggled to work in a situation where their team's skill might be taken away and replaced by individuals in suits further up the chain of command. Lippi, the purest of coaches, was unaffected by such a policy, which was fortunate for Juventus.

He primarily focused on training, designing, nurturing, and debating. He also constructed one of the most spectacularly efficient football teams of all time in the process.

Calcio experienced a significant transformation around the time Lippi took over as coach. Perhaps aided by Corrado Viciani's and Tommaso Maestrelli's attempts with Ternana and Lazio, respectively, to implement Dutch-style Total Football in the 1960s and 1970s, Italian football began to wean itself off of Catenaccio, which often dictated that the luxury of fielding one fantasista meant sacrificing the creativity of all other players.

During the 1980s and 1990s, as zonal marking became more popular, Italy's pitches began to become more systematized. Previously, defense and offense had been separated; now, the whole team had to share responsibility for each set phase and everything in between. Lippi's thinking was based on this core principle.

He was versatile in terms of formation. More focus was put on the team's mental and tactical cohesion. Lippi focuses on team spirit and camaraderie in his book A Game of Ideas: Thoughts and Passions from the Sidelines. His focus on team cohesiveness was a constant throughout his coaching career, but it shined out at Juventus.

The rules of the game came first, but Lippi would make sure the system worked for the players he had. As a result, when he came to the Stadio delle Alpi and was greeted with four high-calibre forwards in Del Piero, Baggio, Ravanelli, and Vialli, he immediately went about putting together a structure that would allow him to maximize the great offensive capabilities at his disposal.

Lippi generally employed a 4-3-3 system with a front three of Vialli, Ravanelli, and one of Baggio or Del Piero during his first two seasons at Juventus. The idea of opening with three pure attackers was novel, but the players had to pay a significant tactical price for it.

"We had to work more, both intellectually and physically," Vialli wrote in his book, "because when you're one of three strikers, you have to run that much more to help out the midfield."

Juventus' front three were extensively engaged in the defensive phase, relentlessly pressuring the opposing back lines. And they were backed up by an unrivaled midfield triad, which often included Sousa, the hungry Conte, and the astute Didier Deschamps.

Lippi was able to mix function and flare to deadly effect via savvy man-management and tactical strategizing.

There was no stopping this Juventus machine, and setbacks only seemed to fuel the team's determination. After a 2-0 loss to Foggia in the sixth match of the 1994/95 Serie A season, they bounced back with six straight victories to keep them in the championship chase. Even tragedy couldn't slow them down.

In May 1994, Andrea Fortunato, a gifted 23-year-old left-back who had joined the club under Trapattoni's guidance, was diagnosed with leukemia. He healed and returned to the first squad, only to get pneumonia and die on April 25, 1995, much too soon.

Juve's next league match was four days later, against Fiorentina. And, despite their dislike for each other, supporters and players from both teams joined together before the game to pay respect to Fortunato. Lippi's team triumphed 4-1 and went on to win the Scudetto for the first time in eight years. Fortunato was honored with the title.

In Lippi's second season in charge, Juventus would lose the championship, but they would win the Champions League in a penalty shootout against Louis van Gaal's Ajax after defeating Dortmund and Real Madrid.

The three striker formation was dropped for the 1996/97 season, but Lippi's versatility shone through once again. In the summer of 1996, Juventus won off stiff competition to sign French playmaker

Zinedine Zidane

, and the system had to adapt to accommodate the arrival of one of football's most treasured talents.

The 4-3-3 was replaced by a 4-3-1-2, with Zidane operating behind a striking duo consisting of Del Piero and one of Vieri, Alen Boki, and Michele Padovano.

Despite the apparent alteration, Lippi's side's themes stayed the same. He wanted all players to be active at all times, creating genuine team cohesiveness that prevented the attackers from just attacking.

 And, in his quest for equilibrium, he was aided by defensive reinforcements in the form of tenacious Uruguayan Paolo Montero, enthusiastic Mark Iuliano, and versatile Gianluca Pessotto, who had joined the resolute Ciro Ferrara, who had accompanied Lippi from

Napoli

.

While Juventus failed to regain the Champions League in 1997, losing 3-1 to Dortmund in a final in which Zidane was suffocated by defensive numbers, they would go on to win practically every other trophy they could, including another league, the European Super Cup, and the Intercontinental Cup.

Lippi, although bringing in an unprecedented era of prosperity, was always calculated. In the 1997/98 season, he experimented with a dynamic 3-4-1-2 structure after recognizing the number of quality defenders at his disposal.

With this change, he was able to play three of Montero, Ferrara, Iuliano, and Moreno Torricelli as wing-backs, with Di Livio and Pessotto as wing-backs, while keeping Zidane behind a front two that now included Filippo Inzaghi.

It was a risky move, but it paid off handsomely. Juventus advanced to their third consecutive Champions League final, losing 1-0 to

Real Madrid

, and won their second consecutive Scudetto, defeating an expensively built Inter team.

Lippi, a coach who emphasized constant improvement, had little time for premature nostalgia, preferring to use trophies to focus his attention. He had rejected dewy-eyed passion in the aftermath of the 1996 Intercontinental Cup triumph against River Plate in favor of reality.

He would later reflect, "I remember going to the bench, to [assistant coach Narciso] Pezzotti and my other staff members and stating that a new cycle started today. In any case, I'm not a huge admirer of parties." The day before the game is preferable than the evening following."

This epitomized Lippi's philosophy throughout his stint at Juventus in the 1990s. Rather than reassuring him, the results encouraged him to make even more progress. A club obsessed with success had hired a coach who understood how to get there but refused to be swayed by it.

Lippi could not have been more qualified for the job as a strategist, motivator, and manager of players. However, there were occasions when black clouds hung over his Juventus' triumphs.

The Calciopoli scandal exposed Bianconeri managing director Luciano Moggi's dark web of influence that he had woven since his arrival at the club in 1994. "The Moggi system was not omnipotent," writes John Foot in Calcio: A History of Italian Football.

For those who doubt Lippi's domestic successes at this period, it's worth noting that the aforementioned system included other teams.

The now 55-year-old Di Livio made 187 appearances for the Old Lady of Turin, winning three Seria A, two Suppercoppa Italiana, one Coppa Italia, one Intercontinental Cup, one UEFA Super Cup, and one UEFA Champions League before leaving for Fiorentina.

After an almost 21-year career in which he made 611 appearances and scored 28 goals, the versatile midfielder retired in 2005.

Some more facts about  Angelo Di Livio:

During Marcello Lippi's tenure as the manager of Juventus, he played as a hairpin winger or full-back, both on the right and the left. During his time at Fiorentina, he was also a center midfielder.

He was known as "the soldier," a term given by Roberto Baggio to underline his unique speed in the race, but which eventually became, in the communal imagination, an acknowledgment of his spirit of sacrifice.

An important fact about Angelo Di Livio is that he begins his football career with the Polisportiva Bufalotta, which derives its name from the same-named district in Rome where Di Livio grew up.

At the age of fifteen, he joined the Roma youth program, where he won the Viareggio Tournament in 1983 and the Primavera Championship the following year.

A notable fact about Angelo Di Livio is that he was later loaned out to Reggiana in Serie C1 and subsequently to Nocerina in the same league.

He finally arrives in the 1987-1988 season at Perugia, in Serie C2, where he wins the championship with another young prospect, Fabrizio Ravanelli; at the end of the year, the Umbrian club redeems him from Rome, and with the red and white he plays in C1 until October 1989, when he transfers to Padova, in Serie B, during the autumn transfer market session.

An important

fact about Angelo Di Livio

is that he was a member of the Venetian club until 1993, when he scored 13 goals in 138 league appearances.

After a lengthy stint in the lower divisions, he joins Juventus at the request of Giovanni Trapattoni, who paid 4 billion lire for him.

On 5 September 1993, he made his Serie A debut at the age of twenty-seven, in an away encounter against Roma (2-1 for the hosts).

He scored his first goal for Juventus on the following 27 October, in a 4-3 loss to

Venezia

in the Italian Cup, while his first goal in the league arrives only at the start of his second season with the Old Lady, on 25 September 1994, in a 1-0 loss to Sampdoria.

He is also helped by Alessandro Del Piero's first Juventus goal, who was once a teammate at Padua. In September 1995, he scored in the Champions League against the Romanians of Steaua Bucarest, which the Turinese won 3-0.

He was one of the immovable owners in Marcello Lippi's many-victorious Juventus, with whom he won three national championships, one Italian Cup and two Super Cups, and one Champions League internationally - joining the select group of players capable of winning the highest European club trophy in their hometown (Rome), preceded by Mateos and Muoz (Madrid) and Stepney (London), and equaled by Anelka (Paris) and Bale (Cardiff).

Despite his great association with the Juventus jersey, he was unwillingly transferred by the Turin club to Fiorentina in the summer of 1999.

He won the Italian Cup with the Viola in 2000-2001, his second after the Bianconeri; nevertheless, the following year he cannot escape the Gigliati's relegation to Serie B, who have since fallen into a significant business problem.

After becoming captain of the squad, he was demoted to Serie C2 after Fiorentina went bankrupt in 2002; in this category, he plays with the new Florentia Viola, a corporation that becomes the custodian of the sports heritage of the vanished Viola club, winning the tournament (and at the same time obtaining the official promotion to Serie B for sporting merits).

He stays with the gigliati for the next two seasons, the first in the cadet series and the second (after winning the interdivisional play-off against Perugia) in Serie A, where he last played in 2005. Fiorentina does not extend the contract at the conclusion of the season; therefore Di Livio decides to quit competitive participation.

On September 6, 1995, at the age of 29, he made his senior international debut in the Italy-Slovenia match (1-0). He competed in the 1996 European Championship in England (with Arrigo Sacchi), the 1998 World Championship in France (with Cesare Maldini), the 2000 European Championship in Belgium, and other nations under the supervision of four different technical commissioners.

Bassi (together with Dino Zoff) and, at the age of almost thirty-six, at the 2002 World Championships in South Korea and Japan (with Giovanni Trapattoni).

On June 18, 2002, he played his last match for the national team, against South Korea, in the round of 16 of the Japanese-Korean World Cup: notable, on the occasion, the focus turned to referee Byron Moreno, after the ejection of

Francesco Totti

.

An important

fact about Angelo Di Livio

is that he has made 40 appearances for the Azzurri, although just 12 of them have been for the whole of a match.

He was the director of the football school "Polisportiva delle Vittorie" in Rome [no source], which was later closed owing to insolvency. From 2006 to 2008, he was a member of the Roma young teams' technical staff as a coach, and from 28 June 2008 to 2010 [without source], he was a member of Marcello Lippi's staff with the national squad.

Dahlia TV hired him as a journalist and pundit. He works as a technical analyst and broadcast commentator for Rai Sport 1, Sky Sport, and the local Teleroma 56 network. He also writes a column for Tele Radio Stereo, the online radio LiveRadio365, and La Gazzetta dello Sport's web TV.

In Domenico Costanzo and Giuseppe Ferlito's film, My favorite team, he portrayed himself.

Angelo Di Livio social media

Regarding

Angelo Di Livio social media

, it should be mentioned that he does not have any pages on any social media platforms.

Angelo Di Livio body measurements

Speaking about

Angelo Di Livio body measurements

, it should be mentioned that the former player is 173cm and 73kg.

Angelo Di Livio net worth and salary

Angelo Di Livio's net worth

is estimated to be about $17 million by 2022. His football career, first as a player and subsequently as a manager, is a major source of revenue for him.

 

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