Giampaolo Pazzini

Full name	Giampaolo Pazzini
Date of birth	2 August 1984 (1984-08-02) (age 26)
Place of birth	Pescia, Italy
Height	1.80 m (5 ft 11 in)
Playing position	Striker

Giampaolo Pazzini (born August 2, 1984 in Pescia) is an Italian footballer who plays for Serie A club Internazionale and the Italian national team

Club career

Early career

Pazzini started his career at Atalanta, with whom he made his professional debut in 2003, and quickly emerging as a promising youngster. He spent two seasons with Atalanta, playing 51 league games and scoring 12 goals (of which 3 of them at Serie A level). He switched from a left back to a striker.

Fiorentina

Pazzini joined Fiorentina from Atalanta for around € 6.5 million in January 2005. During his first season he scored 3 goals, including a fine strike against Juventus (the match finished 3–3) but did not find space in Cesare Prandelli's plans as the latter preferred Luca Toni as the main striker, with Pazzini and Bojinov acting as second strikers.
With the arrival of former Milan striker Alberto Gilardino, Prandelli opted for Adrian Mutu and Gilardino to form a striking partnership, reducing Pazzini to a backup player role.

Sampdoria

As a result of limited first team opportunities, Pazzini agreed a move to Sampdoria on January 2009.
After his first match versus Palermo, in the next matchday Pazzini found the back of the net for the first time with the blucerchiati against Udinese in the Coppa Italia. He scored his first goal in Serie A with his new team on February 1, 2009 in the match against Chievo, finished in a 1–1 draw. His rejuvenated form continued when he hit his first brace with Sampdoria in a 3–0 hammering against Italian champions Internazionale in the Coppa Italia,^[1] and his second consecutive brace arrived in the Serie A encounter against Roma (2–2). He combined very well with Antonio Cassano up front, forming arguably one of the most effective partnership in Serie A in the season.
Pazzini scored 19 goals in his second season at Sampdoria making him the 3rd top scorer in the 2009-10 Serie A season.

Internazionale

Pazzini joined Italian champions Internazionale on a four and a half year deal, on January 28, 2011, with Jonathan Biabiany heading in the opposite direction as part of the deal.^[2] He scored a brace on his debut, a 3-2 home win over Palermo and scored another goal in his second game against Bari. Since his arrival from Sampdoria, he was nicknamed as Il Pazzo ("the Madman"). He also scored the winner in a 1-2 win against Fiorentina on 16th February 2011.

International career

Under-21

Pazzini was formerly a member of the Italy Under-21 team. He holds the record for the first goal and first hat-trick at the new Wembley Stadium. However, Louis Saha broke one of his records, scoring after 26 seconds in the 2009 FA Cup Final.

Senior team

Pazzini received his first senior call-up from head coach Marcello Lippi for a 2010 FIFA World Cup qualification match against Montenegro, marking his debut with a goal. Four days later, Pazzini was awarded with a place in the starting line-up against the Republic of Ireland. Unfortunately his second cap was a less fortunate one as he was sent off in the second minute of the match for elbowing defender John O'Shea. He now holds the record for fastest sending off in Italian history.
Pazzini started the friendly against Northern Ireland at Pisa on 6 June 2009. He missed a penalty in the 55th minute but Italy still emerged victorious 3–0. He took part at the 2010 World Cup in South Africa.