© Getty Images “Why me?”
This, Fabio Grosso remembers, was his reaction to being asked to take the famous spot-kick captured in this photograph. The left-back knew that he had not been among Italy’s five selected penalty takers before the 2006 FIFA World Cup Final™, with Pirlo, Materazzi, De Rossi, Del Piero and Totti the names Marcello Lippi had in mind. Even though Totti had been substituted, there seemed more obvious candidates – Luca Toni, Vincenzo Iaquinta or captain Fabio Cannavaro to name but three – for such an awesome responsibility.
Grosso later spoke of being “astonished” to be asked, reflecting that his last penalty before Berlin had come five years earlier in Serie C2 – Italy’s fourth tier. This experience was typical of the humble pre-2006 career of a defender who had played for Chieti in the lower leagues before slowly rising through the ranks with Perugia and Palermo.
Lippi, though, had an immediate response to Grosso’s ‘Why me?’ query. “Because you’re the man for th..
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