Gianni Brera

Brera is viewed as one of the most influential Italian sports journalists of the 20th century. In 2003, the monumental Arena Civica (stadium), built in Milan by Napoleon I of France in the early 19th century, was renamed Arena Gianni Brera. Brera is widely credited for innovating Italian language, notably by creating a whole new set of terms for football (soccer), some of which have been adopted by other countries. The word libero (sweeper) for the third defender was coined by Brera. Famous nicknames he invented for Italian players include Abatino ("Little Abbot") for Gianni Rivera and Rombo di tuono ("Rolling Thunder") for Gigi Riva. He also nicknamed Silvio Berlusconi Il Cavaliere ("The Knight") after the businessman was awarded the Order of Merit for Labour. Furthermore, he coined the monikers "Il Vecchio Balordo" (The Old Fool) and "La Beneamata" (The Well-Cherished One) for Genoa and Internazionale football clubs, respectively. Living and working in Milan, according to the opinion of some of his colleagues, Brera was a supporter of Internazionale, but he claimed to be a fan of Genoa in order to prevent him from being dragged into the rivalry between Inter, A.C. Milan and Juventus FC and to be freely able to write about those teams without alienating the readerships from their sides. Brera's self-declared fondness for Genoa testified his love for the "heroic age" of Italian football (Genoa was Italy's first club and dominated the football championships until the early 1920s); moreover, after Brera's death the original foundation charter of the Genoa Cricket and Football Club was found among his papers, and his family donated it to a Genoese museum. Apart from the imaginative lexicon, Brera was noteworthy for his rich style and liberal use of foreign or regional phrases. He spoke fluent French and Spanish, a little German and Latin, and some English. In May 2019, Brera was inducted into the Italian Football Hall of Fame for the 2018 edition, under the category Special Awards.