Football Player's Biography 7: Daniele De Rossi

Full name	Daniele De Rossi
Date of birth	24 July 1983 (1983-07-24) (age 27)
Place of birth	Rome, Italy
Height	1.84 m (6 ft ¹⁄₂ in)
Playing position	Central Midfielder

Daniele De Rossi, (born 24 July 1983 in Rome) is an Italian World Cup-winning footballer who plays as a midfielder for Serie A club Roma of which he is the current vice-captain and the Italian national team.
De Rossi joined the Roma youth team from Ostiamare in 2000. He made his first team debut on 10 October 2001, before making his Serie A debut on 25 January 2003 and has since gone on to appear in more than 350 games for the club. With Roma he has won the Coppa Italia twice, the 2007 Supercoppa Italiana and was named Serie A Young Footballer of the Year in 2006.
De Rossi has represented Italy at under-19, under-20, under-21, and senior levels. He was part of the under-21 squad that won the 2004 UEFA European Under-21 Football Championship and the Olympic team which won a Bronze medal at the 2004 Summer Olympics. De Rossi made his debut for the senior team in September 2004 and scored in the process, a 2-1 win over Norway. He was part of the 2006 FIFA World Cup winning-squad and has also participated at Euro 2008, the 2009 FIFA Confederations Cup and the 2010 FIFA World Cup. He was named Italian Footballer of the Year in 2009 and has won 63 caps, scoring 10 times at international level.

Club career

De Rossi joined the youth system of Roma from Ostiamare, where he had played as a striker in 2000. He made his first-team debut on 10 October 2001 against Belgian side Anderlecht in the Champions League. He made his Serie A debut on 25 January 2003 against Como. His first Serie A start, along with his first goal, came on 10 May 2003 against Torino.
In March 2006, De Rossi was praised by referee Mauro Bergonzi for fair play.^[3] Roma were trailing 1–0 in a Serie A match against Messina, when De Rossi scored a goal with his hand, Bergonzi did not see the incident and allowed the equaliser to stand. However, De Rossi immediately told the referee that he had pushed the ball in with his hand leading to the goal being disallowed. Roma went on to win 2–1.

In the 2006–07 season, De Rossi scored from 40 yards against Fiorentina with Sébastien Frey in goal. This was the first of three goals of the night for Roma. He also scored the lone Roma goal in the UEFA Champions League quarter-final against Manchester United in the 2006/07 season in a 7-1 thrashing of Roma by Manchester United.

International career

De Rossi played many matches for the Italy national under-21 football team and was a regular on the squad that won the 2004 UEFA European Under-21 Football Championship. In the same year, he won a bronze medal with the Italy national football team at the Athens Olympics. A few weeks after returning from Greece, De Rossi earned his first cap in the senior squad, scoring on his debut in the 2006 World Cup qualifying game against Norway (2–1), at the age of 21.

2006 World Cup

De Rossi was named to the Italian national team in 2006. During a 2006 World Cup group stage match against the United States, De Rossi received a straight red card after he elbowed Brian McBride in the face. McBride left the pitch bloodied, but returned after treatment, later receiving three stitches. The BBC stated that De Rossi had "disgraced himself with a sickening, needless elbow on Brian McBride."^[4] De Rossi later apologised to McBride, who subsequently praised De Rossi as "classy" for approaching him after the match.^[5] De Rossi was subsequently banned for four matches and fined CHF 10,000.^[6]
After having been disqualified for four matches, De Rossi returned for Italy in the final against France, coming on as a substitute on the 61st minute for Roma teammate Francesco Totti. In the penalty shoot-out at the end of the match (which finished 1–1), De Rossi scored Italy's third penalty to help his country win their fourth FIFA World Cup.

Euro 2008

De Rossi played in all of Italy's Euro 2008 qualifying games, scoring a goal against Georgia. He was also given the honour of wearing the number 10 shirt after Totti decided to retire after the World Cup final. He captained the team on three occasions: two friendly matches against South Africa on 17 October 2007 and Portugal on 6 February 2008, respectively, and in the Euro 2008 qualifier against the Faroe Islands. On 17 June, during UEFA Euro 2008, De Rossi scored on a freekick deflected off Thierry Henry's left boot in a 2–0 win over France. This was his 5th international goal and guaranteed Italy's progress to the quarter-finals. In the quarter-final penalty shoot-out against Spain, his shot was saved by Iker Casillas as Italy lost the shoot-out 4–2. He scored his first double in the national team against Georgia on 10 September 2008.

2009 Confederations Cup

In the 2009 Confederations Cup on 15 June, De Rossi scored for Italy against the United States in the 71st minute with a low long-range strike. The goal put Italy 2–1 up after Giuseppe Rossi had equalized after Landon Donovan scored the opener in the first half. Italy went on to win the game 3-1 after Andrea Pirlo set up Rossi for his second of the game.
De Rossi is tipped by many to be Italy's next captain after Fabio Cannavaro, as De Rossi's dedication to international football is widely admired. An Italian fan favorite, he is noted to be a big game player, and plays a pivotal role in breaking down the opposition and being a box-to-box player. De Rossi has scored crucial goals for Italy in their 2008–09 World Cup Qualifying campaign. For Roma, De Rossi plays mainly as a defensive midfielder but for the Azzurri he gets farther forward with the presence of Gennaro Gattuso in the team as a holding midfielder, and, as a result, his goal ratio is much greater than at club level.

2010 World Cup

De Rossi scored Italy's first goal of the 2010 FIFA World Cup against Paraguay, making the score 1–1.^[7]

Personal life

De Rossi is the son of Alberto De Rossi, former Roma player and Roma's Primavera coach. He married Tamara Pisnoli on 18 May 2006, the mother of his daughter Gaia and ex-dancer of Mediaset, Sarabanda. The couple separated in early 2009.^{[citation needed]}
De Rossi made his debut for Roma wearing the number 27 shirt, which he wore for two seasons. He then switched to the number 4, which he also wore during the 2006 World Cup. With the birth of his daughter on 16 June 2005, he changed to number 16 during the 2005–2006 season.^{[citation needed]}
De Rossi was chosen as Pringles spokesperson for UEFA's Euro 2008 football championship, along with other top European football players such as Thierry Henry, Fernando Torres, Alexander Frei, Philipp Lahm, and Michael Owen. He also appears in an Adidas Dream Big Commercial along with Steven Gerrard, Michael Ballack, and David Beckham.^{[citation needed]}
De Rossi is featured on the cover of FIFA 09 in the Italian version of the game. The picture on the cover is taken from De Rossi's emphatic goal-scoring celebration after scoring versus Internazionale in the Supercoppa Italiana in 2008.