Álvaro Recoba

Oh, absolutely.

When you think about that debut for Inter, you know, against Empoli and Ronaldo's been signed and everyone's expecting, you know, huge force to come in and tear it up from all the money that's been spent on him and instead you get that goal from Recoba which is from absolutely miles out he's got two awesome goals in that game completely takes a narrative of that game on its head and makes it about him and this you know this sort of languid little he was such a silky but small but then he strived it was long it was a strange player with that left foot and you know he stole the show and everyone's like who the heck's that this little boy from Penarol but yeah you're right he's a magical player but there were so many and I think that like you say because football Italy was so iconic there's so many different times when people have moments where Like you say, you watch something and it just, well, at that time, it just grabbed you, didn't it? Because it was so foreign, whereas football now, it feels like we can watch everything.

Yeah, exactly.

It was the scarcity factor as well, wasn't it? But tell me, what was the first time that you ever actually got over to Italy at Rich and saw a match?

... to, to really see him off properly.

I'm sorry, do you remember like a few years ago Álvaro Recoba, the Uruguayan playmaker, had his big sendoff and it was...

I can't remember whether it was Nacional or Uruguay, but it was against the rest of the world, and they got- Like major European stars and stuff down.

If they can do that in Gran Parque Central for Alvaro Recoba, then the AFA can put something on in the Monumental for the best player of all time.

In 04-05, which became his last season, I think, he still scored 17 goals in 36 appearances.

But Adriano had become the automatic first-choice striker, while Oba Martins, Julio Cruz, Recoba gave Mancini younger and more tactically adaptable alternatives.

And so...

there were reports at the time i remember that stated that mancini had concluded that he became difficult to manage when he was not starting not necessarily because he behaved badly but because a player of his status was unlikely to accept uh you know a role in the background as ahead of what was the 2006 world cup which he was not part of now the final controversy uh concerned the Coppa Italia finals against Roma on the 12th and 15th of June, because back then they were two-legged ties.