Following Giuseppe Rossi’s Euro Dreams

January 30th, 2012 | by: elaine | Comments Off

With our next fixture coming up February 29th in Genoa against the United States, I realized what a shame it is that Giuseppe Rossi is injured right now. Certainly, he likes to score against his native country, he scored a brace when we met in 2009 in the Confederations Cup. But more important than delightfully watching him punish the American team in a friendly, I wonder whether or not he’ll be able to make it back to full fitness in time for the Euros this summer? I couldn’t find an answer for sure, but I think he’d be the first American to play in the Euros, too, which would be cool. And after being tragically left behind for South Africa by Lippi, I’d really like to see him play in a major tournament.

Giuseppe Rossi’s career was on the up and up for both club and country when he tore a cruciate ligament on October 26th last year while playing with Villareal and had surgery for it the next day. It was a huge blow to his club team, but also a blow to the Azzurri. Not that we aren’t blessed with an abundance of talent up front, but he and fellow striker Antonio Cassano were providing some of the most exciting and dynamic play up front that we’ve seen in a long while. And with both of them out long term, and Euro dreams in doubt, it’s emotionally tough to watch as a fan.

I have been following Giuseppe Rossi on Twitter for a while now, and it was heart wrenching to follow his plight post injury. It’s nice to be able to get little bits of information as he rehabilitates, but certainly I’ve learned so much more about him than just his steps to recovering. When a player uses social media consistently, you get a little peek into their lives and realize they’re ot all that different from us. Here is a little bit of what I’ve learned from peeking in the window that is his Twitter account:

@GiuseppeRossi22 Profile: Player for Villareal F.C….. Been around the world…. Hometown is always NJ…. Of course New Jersey may always be home, but this is what he wakes up to at his home in Spain:

Giuseppe tweets in 3 languages: English, Italian, and Spanish. He tweets to family, friends, and obsessed fans, too. He’s got over 375,000 followers, though, so don’t always expect a tweet back.

One of the first things I learned about Giuseppe Rossi from his Twitter account is that he loves Peanut M&M’s. He even tweeted a pic of them on the plane with him. After the injury, he tweeted that he was going to have to give them up so he wouldn’t put on weight.

He likes to listen to Jay Z and Kanye West and Beyoncé, amongst others, and loves the show Jersey Shore. In fact, he once tweeted Snooki about having the wrong Italian jersey, that she should have gotten #22 (his number.)

There is no doubt who he will be rooting for on Sunday in the Super Bowl. His American Football team is the Giants, or “g-men” as he calls them. He even attended a game when he was visiting home at Christmas time.

He has also tweeted about his Azzurri experiences, such as this photo he took and labeled “con il grande pirlo” (with the great Pirlo) traveling on an airplane last summer with the team:

Or this photo of Coverciano after a lot of rain:

To add insult to injury, he has had to watch his teams on TV, but of course still supports them religiously. It has been especially hard to watch him follow Villareal helplessly as they have sunk to relegation danger, currently 17th place in La Liga without him, despite a 4th place finish last year. I remember he tweeted about his first game that he was missing, that he was watching his team on TV, something he’d never done before & it felt really weird. I never really thought about how hard that must be as a player, and I certainly hope he doesn’t have to do it with the Azzurri this summer.

As for rehabilitating, he seems very anxious to get back to fitness. Of course any footballer would be, but especially in a tournament year like this one. He has been faithfully going to rehab, where he recently tweeted that he “was jamming to Beyonce’s album “4” during my rehab today. That’s a kickass album btw.” He tweeted a picture of his first run after the surgery, but it was in a lovely antigravity treadmill contraption:

I have not been able to find details on how much longer he is expected to be out, but the initial prognosis would put him back by May. The truth is, often no one knows for sure with these injuries until the player is actually fit. And then he’s got to quickly make the grade with Prandelli, and there is more competition than ever for a Euro spot. But I would not count him out. In addition to being very talented, he’s very determined, so you just may see him fulfill his Euro Dreams after all.

So, now that you’ve read about my Twitter voyeurism and seen the human side of Giuseppe Rossi, I thought it would be interesting to take a little poll to see what you think of Giuseppe Rossi making it back for Euros this summer:

Follow Elaine @ItalyWCB as she follows @GiuseppeRossi22 , even if she’s not half as exciting and is guaranteed not to get to Euros this year, even as a fan.