Former Inter Milan and Italy forward Sandro Mazzola, one of the defining figures of the Nerazzurri’s golden era, has died aged 83, the club announced on Saturday.
“Sandro Mazzola was one of the greatest footballers in history. Not only in the history of the Nerazzurri,” Inter said in a statement.
Mazzola was a key figure in the Inter side that dominated Italian football in the mid-1960s, winning four Serie A titles and consecutive European Cups in 1964 and 1965.
He scored 158 goals in 565 appearances for Inter and delivered one of the finest performances of his career in the 1964 European Cup final, scoring twice in a 3-1 victory over Real Madrid.
His display earned the admiration of Hungarian great Ferenc Puskás, who gave Mazzola his shirt after the match.
“I played against your father. You are worthy of him,” Puskás told him.
Mazzola was the son of Valentino Mazzola, the legendary Torino captain who was killed in the 1949 Superga air disaster. The crash claimed 31 lives, including 18 players and eight Italy internationals from the celebrated “Grande Torino” side.
Sandro Mazzola went on to establish his own legacy with Italy, scoring 22 goals in 70 appearances and helping the Azzurri win the 1968 European Championship. Italy defeated Yugoslavia 2-0 in a replay in Rome to claim the title.
He also featured in the 1970 World Cup final in Mexico, where Italy were beaten 4-1 by Brazil, led by Pelé.
A year later, Mazzola finished second to Johan Cruyff in the Ballon d’Or voting.
After a 17-year professional career, Mazzola retired in 1977 and remained involved in football, taking up an executive role at Inter before later serving as sporting director of Torino.
“Today, another piece of the Nerazzurri legend leaves us. Sandro was Inter: he joined the club as a boy and chose to stay here forever, one shirt, seventeen seasons, an entire lifetime,” said Inter president Giuseppe Marotta.
“With (Helenio) Herrera’s Grande Inter, he wrote chapters that nobody will ever erase. Today, it is our duty to preserve his memory, because a club is only as great as its memory. And Sandro’s memory will remain with us, forever.”
AFP
