Alessandro Del Piero top player

Alessandro Del Piero is an Italian football player. He is currently the captain of Juventus and a member of the Italian national side. He was a part of the 2006 FIFA World Cup winning side.
Usually, Del Piero plays as a support-striker and occasionally between the midfield and the strikers (in the hole), known in Italy as the "Trequartista" position. He is not the tallest of forwards, but is certainly one of the most creative forwards in the world, rather than being a "goal poacher".
Del Piero is renowned for his deadly finishing, and the ease in which he dribbles past defenders. He is an expert in dead-ball situations as he is among the world's best in taking freekicks and penalty kicks. Particularly famous for inside-curling, dipping shot that he takes in the area that is up to 10 yards outside the penalty box, which is known as "La Zona Del Piero" meaning "The Del Piero Zone".

Club

Del Piero was spotted playing for hometown San Vendemiano — he left home at the age of 16 to start his professional career in 1991 with Padova of Italian Serie B. In 1993, he transferred to Juventus, and has been there ever since. Del Piero made his Serie A debut against Foggia in September 1993, scored his first goal in his next game against Reggina after appearing as a substitute, and then grabbed a hat-trick against Parma on his first start. Juventus claimed their first Scudetto in eight years in his first season and success continued to follow.
With the Turin club, he won the Serie A championship five times (1995, 1997, 1998, 2002, and 2003), the Champions League (1996), and the Intercontinental Cup (1996). His best season was in 1997-98, when he scored 21 goals in Serie A and finished top scorer in the UEFA Champions League with 10 goals, which included a peach of a freekick against Monaco in the semi finals. Del Piero struggled for form at the beginning of the 1998-99 season, whilst doping allegations were aimed at Juventus (they were later found innocent). In October he picked up a serious knee injury in the 2-2 draw with Udinese. This kept him out of action for the remainder of the season. Juventus struggled without him and limped home to a lowly 6th place in Serie A. It is claimed by some that Del Piero has never fully recovered from this injury, and therefore never quite fulfilled the potential he had shown at a very young age.

His nickname is Pinturicchio, in reference to a joke by Gianni Agnelli when he compared the emerging Del Piero to Roberto Baggio in a parallel between the student Pinturicchio from Perugia and the teacher Caravaggio.
One of Del Piero's greatest strengths as a footballer is his versatility, which allows him to play in a variety of attacking positions. While he started his club career playing as a full-fledged striker, he settled into a more deeper role as a support-striker. Because of his great technical ability, accurate passing skills and impressive vision, he has also been positioned as a playmaker; in the central slot behind the forwards. In any zone surrounding the penalty area, his prowess as a creator of goals came to the fore. Under Marcello Lippi's reign as Juventus coach, Del Piero's creative abilities were on display whatever the coach's formation was. Del Piero showed his class in the lethal "trident-attack" formation along with veterans Gianluca Vialli and Fabrizio Ravanelli. After that, he took a leading role in a creative combination with Zinedine Zidane behind Filippo Inzaghi. As Juve's playing style changed in Lippi's second stint with Juventus starting 2001, Del Piero was still vital as his partnerships with Pavel Nedved in midfield and David Trezeguet upfront has contributed enormously to Juve's continued success in Italy and Europe.

National

Despite huge success on the club level, Del Piero has somewhat disappointed playing for the Italian national team, although he is currently the national teams all-time 4th topscorer.
Coming into the 1998 FIFA World Cup with huge expectations, he competed with fan favorite Roberto Baggio for a spot, and had some troubles because of a recent injury he picked up during the Champions' League final whilst playing for Juventus. Two years later Del Piero became one of the culprits for Italy's last minute loss in Euro 2000 final, missing 2 chances, which might have killed France off.
However, he returned to the international scene in the 2002 FIFA World Cup on the back of a very impressive season in Serie A, in which he led Juventus to the title.
He scored a goal against Mexico with his first touch of the game seconds within coming on as a substitute to send Italy through to the second round, but they would get no further.
After Euro 2004, Del Piero faced another tough moment after Juventus replaced their Coach Marcello Lippi with Fabio Capello. Capello was not convinced of Del Piero's abilities and favoured the new signing from Ajax, Zlatan Ibrahimovic. However, the Juve captain fought back and scored 14 goals in Serie A that season, helping Juventus to their 28th Scudetto. Most memorable perhaps was his bicycle-kick assist against AC Milan which sealed the Scudetto for Juventus.
Although a strong fan favourite, the Juventus captain found himself starting on the bench for most of Italy’s matches in the World Cup 2006. During all of the group stage matches, Del Piero started on the bench, coming on twice; first as a substitute late in game in the first match with Ghana. Then in the following match he came on as a substitute at the 54th minute in the match against the U.S.A.
Del Piero was more active for Italy during the knockout stages; starting in the last 16 clash with Australia. On July 4, 2006 while facing host nation Germany in the semifinals of the competition, Del Piero, after coming on as a substitute towards the end of the game, scored Italy's second goal as a ball found him all alone with just the German keeper, Jens Lehmann, in front of him. Del Piero proceeded to score the goal with a chip past Lehmann. This goal was chosen as one of the best of the tournament.
Del Piero scored the fourth penalty kick in the finals of World Cup 2006, helping Italy to win the World Championship for the 4th time in its history.