Vicenza, Italy (August 17, 2000) Roberto Baggio is angry about his lack of first team opportunities for Inter Milan last season. The former Italian international rarely figured in Marcello Lippi's side and was subsequently not offered an extension to his contract this summer.

Baggio said, "I do not expect gratitude as this is not a part of football. I have heard that I cannot play for an entire match and that I am a problem in the dressing room too many times. These are just lies meant to justify my being kept on the bench."

Baggio has struggled to find a suitable club this summer, but revealed that he will wait for the right offer to come along.

He said, "I am calm and not really worried about it. I have trained on my own for the last month thanks to some help from Argentine fitness coach Enrique Miguel and my physio.

"Obviously it all sounds a bit strange but I am able to accept whatever is offered these days. This way I have more time to spend with my family who are the most important thing in my life.

"I need to find a club who will allow me to play at the top and if this is not possible here in Italy, then I may consider a move abroad. I'm not in any hurry and I can wait."

Baggio eyes France, England and Spain

Vicenza, Italy (August 17, 2000) Roberto Baggio has decided to consider offers from France, England and Spain after failing to find a suitable club in Italy. The out of contract striker revealed that he had rejected a move to Reggina because they were too far from his hometown in Vicenza. But he insisted that several other clubs have shown an interest in him.

He said, "As for question whether any one wants me, ask my manager Vittorio Petrone how many teams called him.

"The problem is the conditions that I put on any deal. It's not only a money problem. I would like to play for a top team, try to win something of importance, and try to win back a place in the national team.

"Reggina called me. Their chairman Lillo Foti was very nice, but I can't go to a city that is two hours flight from my home, and that can't fight for one of the best positions in the championship.

"If I am going to stay so far from my home, I would prefer to go to another place in Europe, where maybe I could win.

"I understand that I have to accept some conditions. So, I told my manager that I can accept France, England or Spain. Now he's working on this."

Baggio laments decline of Italian soccer

Milan, Italy (April 25, 22000) Italian soccer is on the wane because there's too little skill and too much muscle, according to national idol Roberto Baggio.

Baggio is the latest soccer icon to be tackled by the Gazzetta dello Sport since the paper began a campaign last week to find out the causes of Italy's woes.

The national side, World Cup finalist in 1994, has slumped to a dismal 14th in the FIFA rankings, while none of its club sides have made it into either of the European cup semifinals this season - for the first time in 13 years.

Baggio believes that Italian soccer is now all about physique rather than technique, and that coaches are more interested in systems of play than bringing out the best in players.

"When I was little, I was taught how to stop the ball, how to hit it when it was stationary and when you were running forward," he told the paper. "Today, three-quarters of training is done without a ball.

"Players run. Once I even got injured because I was made to run with weights. It felt like I was pulling a train."

And things are little better on the pitch, he claimed.

"The real problem is coaches who put their system of play above everything else. Organization is useful, but it should come afterwards - as a way of putting together 10 footballers. But first, you need the footballers.

"Today, unless you run, they don't just tell you that you're slow, they say you don't understand the new kind of football.

"I, on the other hand, would always pick players who are on first-name terms with the ball. It's better to have 10 disorganized people who can play football than 10 organized people who just run."

Baggio also paints a portrait of a high-pressure game where there is no room for a moment's fun, not even in training.

"During the week, if you try a joke or do something different, you'll be criticized and accused of not being concentrated," he said. "It's hard now to have any fun, even in training.

"And yet, passion and entertainment should come first in this job."

Baggio: "I hope there is still room for me"

(January 26, 2000) "I haven't being raised from the dead because I was never dead! In this last period I never gave up or got depressed, as I know how things work with soccer. I tried to live it the best I could and to accept trainer's line-up choices, but I always strived to have a good position in the team.

"I accept everything, except when i'm expected to turn the results around in ten minutes, as it's difficult to score even when you're on the field for the whole match." Roby added he didn't appreciate "critics after playing few minutes in the match against Juve.

"I hope in the future there will be still room for me and that number ten, which entertains supporters, will never be out of fashion. I felt my team-mates' excitement and Lippi's shake of hand as very sincere. So, people will stop saying I cause problems in the changing room: they'll invent another story".

Roberto Baggio hopes Lippi will have trust in him now

(January 24, 2000) After the match, in which Baggio scored the winning goal for Inter, he said "I'm very very happy today, my last goal was on May in the Uefa playoff against Bologna, but it wasn't as important as this one!

"I just think of my work everyday and do it in the best way I can. I had nothing against Lippi during the past few months, he is the coach and to decide who play is his work. He was fair since he always specified that to keep me on the bench was his own choice. I was angry with those people who said I could not play because of injuries or a bad condition. I am, and I was, ready to play.

"Lippi congratulated me at the end of the match, I appreciated that! I don't like to be the source of troubles for my club. I also want to thank my teammates who celebrated with me after the goal! After some bad performance in away matches, we won again, and this could be an important point of our championship!

"I don't know now if Lippi will give me more space, I hope he will have more trust in me now. Obviously I'd like to play more often, but anyway I will continue to work hard. And I can assure anyone I have never thought to retire myself!"

Lippi went back on his word, Baggio says

Milan, Italy (December 14, 1999) Roberto Baggio said in an interview published on Tuesday he would have left Inter Milan before the season started if he had known how little first-team soccer he would play this season.

Baggio accused Inter coach Marcello Lippi of going back on his word by frequently leaving him on the bench and hinted that he might leave Inter next year, possibly for modest Vicenza where he began his career.

"When Lippi arrived at Inter he said he wanted to talk to me and during that conversation he told me I'd be in the first team because he considered me an important player," Baggio told Gazzetta dello Sport newspaper.

"I went on holiday to Argentina convinced I would have a role to play this season. However, things have changed.

"I just want to say that if I had known from the start I was to spend so much time on the bench I would have accepted one of the many offers I had," the 32-year-old forward said.

Baggio has made only five appearances for Inter since Lippi arrived in the close season -- all of them as a second-half substitute. He has spent only two-and-a-half hours on the pitch this season.

"After the discussion with Lippi I was still enthusiastic but now I realise he hasn't kept his promises and therefore I can't say I have the same enthusiasm I had in the summer," Baggio said

Asked where he would go next summer, Italy's hero from the 1994 World Cup replied: "I don't know. It depends how the season finishes. Anything could happen. Maybe I'll even go back to Vicenza. It would be great to finish my career where I started it."

Baggio started his career at Vincenza in the early 1980s before establishing himself as one of Italy's top players at Fiorentina between 1985 and 1990. His move to Juventus in 1990 sparked riots in Florence.

Baggio played at the Turin club for five seasons, scoring 78 goals in 141 league matches and helping Italy to reach the 1994 World Cup final.

After two seasons at Milan he went to Bologna where he rekindled his career and won a place in Italy's 1998 World Cup squad. He joined Inter after the tournament.

Baggio dreams of 2002 World Cup

Tokyo, Japan (October 8, 1999) Italy's Roberto Baggio said on Friday he had ruled out a lucrative move to the English premier league because it would damage his chances of a national team recall.

Speaking at a Tokyo news conference, the 32-year-old Inter Milan forward said it was his goal to play in a fourth World Cup.

"Italy is a special place and I want to stay there because I have a better chance of impressing the national team manager." he said.

"My physical condition is very good and I intend to keep playing for at least three more years. In fact it's my dream to play in the 2002 World Cup. If I can achieve that I will retire very happily."

Baggio said he had received several offers to go to the premier league, where several of his compatriots play, but had turned them down to stay in the Serie A spotlight. He did not name the clubs.

Baggio will play alongside AC Milan's Leonardo in a J.League exhibition match at Tokyo's National Stadium on Monday.

"When I came here before, I was aware of the skill of the Japanese players. All they needed was time and experience," said Baggio.

"The fact that Hidetoshi Nakata is playing so well for Perugia is proof of the progress being made here in Japanese soccer," he said of the 1997 and 1998 Asian Footballer of the Year.

Baggio hopes Inter's 'nightmare' is over

Milan, Italy (July 21, 1999) Roberto Baggio is looking to make amends to Inter Milan president Massimo Moratti after what he called a "nightmare" season with the club.

Baggio's arrival from Bologna last summer helped to make Inter the pundits' favorite for the Serie A title. But injuries to both Baggio and Ronaldo - along with a run of dismal results and four consecutive coaches - made it one of the club's worst seasons for decades.

Now the team has been re-built under new coach Marcello Lippi and Baggio is keen to repay a few debts.

"Last season people talked about Inter too much," he said. "And what could be an advantage for us now is that this season Inter are seen as just one of the favorites, and not the favorites.

"When I said last year that we had a great team it was true. But then the problems started and they ended up ruining everything: the season became a nightmare, nothing went right and even the easiest things became complicated and even embarassing."

A divided locker-room was one of the major problems, but Baggio preferred to remain silent. "I know what happened," he said. "But it wouldn't be right for me to explain it."

But asked if he felt indebted, he admitted: "Yes, I do. To Inter, but also to Moratti. If I'm fortunate enough to be playing in a big team once again, I owe it to him."

Baggio will, meanwhile, have to build a new relationship with Lippi - one of the men held responsible by many for Baggio's unexpected departure from Juventus in 1995, usurped by his then understudy Alessandro Del Piero.

Playing down his first chat with Lippi at Inter, Baggio said: "He didn't say anything in particular: just that I was part of his plans and that I would be staying ... I've had far fewer problems with coaches than people make out; I had four of them last season, ask them."

Baggio won the league with Lippi in their last season together, playing alongside Turin heroes Gianluca Vialli and Fabrizio Ravanelli. Next season, he will join another all-star attack with Christian Vieri and Ronaldo, and the parallels have inevitably been drawn.

"Let's just say that there's good reason to think that some things could be repeated," he said.

"(Ronaldo and Vieri) are both two great players, but Inter fans have had enough of dreams. After what happened last season, I'd rather just wait and see. You can't take anything for granted."

Baggio, 32, has another year of his contract at Inter, but no plans, or need, to retire. His kind of creative genius remains a rare thing, even in Italian football.

"I think that soccer has always lived on creativity," he told the Gazzetta dello Sport.

"Having an organized system of play is fundamental, but at the same time, it's the thing that's 'different', that's unexpected, which brings people to matches and makes them love football."

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