Quotes & Sayings About Italian Football

When I think of New York City, I think of all the girls, the Jewish girls, the Italian girls, the Irish, Polack, Chinese, German, Negro, Spanish, Russian girls, all on parade in the city. I don't know whether it's something special with me or whether every man in the city walks around with the same feeling inside him, but I feel as though I'm at a picnic in this city. I like to sit near the women in the theaters, the famous beauties who've taken six hours to get ready and look it. And the young girls at the football games, with the red cheeks, and when the warm weather comes, the girls in their summer dresses ... — Irwin Shaw

When an Italian tells me it's pasta on the plate, I check under the sauce to make sure. — Alex Ferguson

I had lots of posters on my bedroom wall of players like Zico, many Brazilian and Italian players, not many players in particular but I loved football so much and I especially loved skilful players. — Emmanuel Petit

This is a unique scandal in Italian football history - with Juventus as the victims of an injustice. — John Foot

You don't look for jobs. You don't phone up 10 clubs and say, Here I am. You are offered the job. I was in Benfica many years ago. I was leaving the training ground and I had a car after me. It went on for 10 minutes. Anyhow, he stopped and I stopped and he said, I'm from the Italian embassy. Ah yes, and what do you want? I want your phone number because Roma wants you as a manager next season. Three months later I was sitting on the bench in Roma. I don't think the rest of working society works like football. — Sven-Goran Eriksson

Do you remember when we played in Spain in the Anglo-Italian Cup? — Shaun Newton

(The paradox of Italian soccer). As everyone knows, Italian men are the most foppish representatives of their sex on the planet. They smear on substantial quantities of hair care products and expend considerable mental energies color-coordinating socks with belts. Because of their dandyism, the world has Vespa, Prada, and Renzo Piano. With such theological devotion to aesthetic pleasure, it is truly perplexing that their national style of soccer should be so devoid of this quality. — Franklin Foer

The surname Messi comes from the Italian town of Porto Recanati, in the province of Macerata, which saw the birth of the poet Giacomo Leopardi and the tenor Beniamino Gigli. — Luca Caioli

Italian football is great but for me, for the style of player I am, I found it too tactical, too slow. — Djibril Cisse

When I wasn't famous, I had a lot of friends, almost all of them Italian. The racism only started when I started to play football. — Mario Balotelli

When I was in Dutch and Italian football, a lot of people looked at Manchester United, and when they were asked who was the best player, a lot of them said Paul Scholes. Much of what he did looked simple, but actually it was quite hard. Invariably he controlled the ball instantly and passed it straight on, keeping the game moving. He made inch-perfect passes across the pitch; he saw the gaps and could play the ball through them. So it didn't surprise me that so many top-class international footballers recognized his quality. — Edwin Van Der Sar

Shevchenko is the best attacker in Europe. He has a great deal of consistency and he just keeps scoring - which in Italian football is very difficult. He is a complete player, someone who can do everything on a football field — Andriy Shevchenko

Roberto Mancini's got that Italian style, the old joie de vivre. — Perry Groves

As the Protestants celebrate a goal, they're egged on by the team captain, a long-haired Italian called Lorenzo Amoruso, who has the look of a 1980s male model. Flailing his arms, he urges them to sing their anti-Catholic songs louder. The irony is obvious: Amoruso is a Catholic. For that matter, so are most of the Rangers players. Since the late nineties, Rangers routinely field nearly as many Catholics as Celtic. Their players come from Georgia, Argentina, Germany, Sweden, Portugal and Holland, because money can buy no better ones. Championships mean more than religious purity. — Franklin Foer