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He never won the World Cup or the Champions League. When Fiorentina sold him to Juventus, fans rioted in the streets. He missed the most famous penalty in football history. He tried to reform Italian football, but was painfully ignored. Still, Roberto Baggio has zero haters. He became the best player of the nineties. Born in Caldogno, a small town in Veneto, the sixth of eight siblings, his father was a factory worker who also played amateur football. At nine years old he was already being scouted by local coaches. At thirteen, Vicenza paid £300 for him. He scored 110 goals in 120 youth matches. Then the knee. At eighteen, before his career had properly started, he tore both his cruciate ligament and meniscus. Two years of surgery, recovery, relapse, depression, more surgery. A friend named Fabrizio Boldrini saw him drowning and handed him Buddhist texts. Baggio read them and converted. He began each day with chanting, knowing the pain would never fully leave his leg. "During massage my right leg makes unnatural sounds, as if it's about to break. The pain never leaves me. Any training session can be the last. He made it back, first to Fiorentina. Then to the World Cup. Italia '90. Coach Azeglio Vicini didn't start him consistently, which Baggio took as a personal insult. Then against Czechoslovakia he received the ball deep in his own half, dribbled past four defenders, and slotted the ball into the corner. Best goal of the tournament. In the mixed zone afterward, a journalist noticed the grown-out curly ponytail tied loosely at the back of his head and wrote that this was Il Divin Codino. The Divine Ponytail. The name stuck for the rest of his life. That same summer, Fiorentina sold him to Juventus for a world record fee. Fans rioted. Windows smashed, tear gas fired in the streets of Florence. Baggio cried at the press conference where the sale was announced. He was leaving a city that worshipped him for a club where he could compete for all major trophies. 1994. His tournament. Italy were a team of injury doubts, squad politics and a coach who didn't always believe in him. They barely made it through the group stage. Then Baggio exploded. Equalised against Nigeria in the 88th minute with Italy on the verge of elimination, then netted the winning penalty in extra time. The winner against Spain. Two goals against Bulgaria. Five goals across the knockouts, he literally carried Italy to the final. The final was goalless after 120 minutes. Penalties. Baresi and Massaro had already missed. Baggio stepped up last. "That penalty cost me dearly. I haven't watched it again since. I never will." He stood in the Pasadena heat with his hands on his hips and his head bowed. The camera stayed on his face. The whole world watched while he was alone. Football fans around the world never stopped loving him. In Japan, where he was already a national obsession after appearing in the football manga Captain Tsubasa, children cried in the streets. In Italy the response was almost entirely sympathy. He had given them everything. The penalty was one moment in the final he had basically reached single-handedly. He came back for 1998. Scored two goals in the group stage and netted the first penalty in the shootout against France in the quarter-finals. Albertini and Di Biagio missed. His third World Cup, again ended in a shootout. He won far more individual prizes than club trophies. The Ballon d'Or in 1993. The FIFA World Player of the Year the same year. He was named in Pelé's FIFA 100. He scored in three separate World Cups and became Italy's joint top scorer in World Cup history, alongside Paolo Rossi and Christian Vieri. He never won the World Cup. He never won the Champions League. Ironically, he was always the best player on the losing side. Then, after retiring, he tried to fix Italian football. In 2010, following their catastrophic group stage exit at the World Cup, the Italian federation appointed him head of their technical sector. He spent the next year analysing everything wrong with Italian football from the grassroots up, working with 50 experts, and in December 2011 presented the federation with a 900-page reform document titled "Renew the Future." He called for 100 new training centres across Italy, a completely rebuilt youth development system, better-educated coaches, and an end to the tactical obsession that had replaced technique at every level of the game. The document was not even read. "I submitted my project in December 2011 and it remained a dead letter," he said later. In 2013 he resigned. "They do not allow me to work." In 2016 he summarised the whole experience in a few clear words: "All my enormous work has turned into waste paper." Italy has since missed three consecutive World Cups. The worst run in their history. The president who dismissed his report, the coach who presided over the decline, the officials who chose comfort over reform, all of them are gone now, the federation is in crisis, the stadiums are crumbling, the young players are not coming through, or leaving for foreign leagues before doing so. The 900 pages are still there. Italy is not. Il Divin Codino. 🇮🇹

Alain Sutter 🇨🇭 Saeed Al-Owairan 🇸🇦 Jorge Campos 🇲🇽 Roberto Baggio 🇮🇹 Hristo Stoichkov 🇧🇬 Romario 🇧🇷 Gheorghe Hagi 🇷🇴 Diego Maradona 🇦🇷 Alexi Lalas 🇺🇸 Tomas Brolin 🇸🇪 Michel Preud’Homme 🇧🇪 Who was your favourite player at the FIFA World Cup USA 1994? Choose 2 or 3 players!