Giorgio Chiellini was the embodiment of the Italian defensive tradition, a rugged, cerebral centre-back who turned the art of stopping strikers into a spectacle. He anchored Juventus’s defence through a run of Serie A dominance and captained the club with fierce authority.
For Italy he formed a formidable partnership at the back and crowned his international career by lifting the European Championship in 2020, marshalling the Azzurri to the title. Combative, streetwise and thoroughly modern in his reading of the game, he was admired across Europe.