Calafiori recalls: 'Playing for Roma gave me anxiety.'

Yahoo

5 days ago

Former Roma defender Riccardo Calafiori looked back on his past in the Italian capital.
In a recent interview with Sky Sport, Calafiori discussed his friendship with Edoardo Bove as well as the difficult years at Roma.
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'I played with Bove, who arrived in my second year and is now one of my best friends in football.'
'When he felt ill I remember that I wasn't watching the game. I turned on the TV just to know the result and I saw that the game was stopped, I thought they had simply postponed it. Right after that my mother called me in tears, she is as good a friend of Bove's mother as we are. I didn't understand what was happening, it was a big blow.'
On the surgeries that threatened his career, 'At 16, after the first operation, they told me I would never be able to play football again. I didn't want to hear that. If it had happened 3-4 years later, I probably wouldn't have come back. Instead, the recklessness of being a child, that challenge with myself and against those who thought differently… All this pushed me to go on.'
'For me, Roma was a dream come true. For my age, I didn't think I had done badly, but I lived the games with too much pressure. Games used to give me anxiety. I was too small and too involved, I remember that I was happy only when the referee blew the whistle and the game ended. Now I can't wait for the day of the match to arrive, I'm not anxious anymore.'
'The move to Basel? The truth is that that was the only option. I wasn't convinced, but then I found peace and continuity. I went back to playing with carefreeness.'