Product Description

As an unknown apprentice with Third Division club Swansea Town in the 1960s, Chinaglia stole milk bottles from doorsteps because he couldn't afford breakfast. Nine years later he was on an annual salary of #85, 000. Chinaglia, who had lived in South Wales since he was eight, returned to his native Italy to rebuild his ailing career and, after spells with two Third Division clubs, he joined Roman side Lazio in 1969. There, in the Olympic Stadium, Chinaglia became the idol of the Lazio tifosi. In 1974 he finished Series A top scorer with 24 goals and helped Lazio to their first - and so far, only - league title, pipping the traditional giants Juventus, Milan and Inter. This biography tells his remarkable rags-to-riches story.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #775645 in Books
• Published on: 2000-10-26
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 208 pages

Customer Reviews

Readable. Best suited to S Wales and Rome football fans.
The book charts the life of Giorgio Chinaglia, born in Carrera, brought up in Cardiff, and eventually made famous in Rome.

In the true spirit of Swansea-Cardiff rivalry I bought the book hoping to laugh myself stupid at the Jacks letting slip a world class player through their fingers, but in true Cardiff City fashion, to be mirrored later in the case of Dean Saunders, it turns out that he Chinaglia was rejected by Cardiff long before he was given the boot by the Swans.

The author is sympathetic to Chinaglia, but the overiding impression that I took from the book was that of a boy who wanted for nothing whilst growing up who turned into a self-centered petulent egoist as an adult.

The author draws mainly on interviews with Chinaglias contempories at Swansea, Lazio, the Italian national side and New York Cosmos, who are all polarised into pro and anti camps, although even his supporters acknowledge his selfishness; there is rarely a middle ground.

If you enjoy sport in South Wales you will probably enjoy it. It's a good but not a great read.