MILAN – Giorgio Mariani went down in history for being a genius as brilliant as he was erratic. He was a straightforward man, and not one who liked to talk, not even on the pitch. But if he was on form, he would bear down on you and no measure of determination could stop him.
"How he was able to take off like that, smoking five packs of Muratti a day, nobody could ever understand. But he ran like a demon," was how the journalist Leo Turrini once described Mariani, summarising his Jekyll and Hyde-ness perfectly.
His burst of pace and competitive appetite were among the qualities that, back in November 1973, caught the eye of one Helenio Herrera. During his second, short-lived spell at Inter, Herrera became aware of the need for a player touched by genius, a figure to bring what Jair da Costa brought to the team during his trophy-laden first experience with Inter. Helenio asked club president Ivanoe Fraizzoli for the young Italian, who was as enamoured with dribbling and the more beautiful side of the game as the Brazilian he would be asked to emulate once was.
In some respects, Mariani’s career was marked by a constant struggle to truly realise his potential, for rarely was his undeniable quality underpinned by the consistency necessary to maintain the highest standards. Disappointingly, the story was the same at Inter.
Mariani spent a season and a half with the Nerazzurri, making 57 appearances in total. It seems too few for a player who, barring a fleeting spell at Palermo, had arrived in Milan a reigning Serie A champion with Bruno Pesaola’s Fiorentina, full of the best intentions of being the perfect partner for Roberto Boninsegna.
Though Mariani’s surly, straight-talking personality was something of an anomaly for the era, it did not overshadow his skills on the pitch. He played with his socks rolled down around his ankles, dark curls cascading down his face. The sight of those curls connecting with Pier Luigi Pizzaballa’s cross to score Inter’s fifth goal in the unforgettable 5-1 derby win over AC Milan in 1974 will not easily be forgotten. Yet the television audience were robbed of one of his 11 goals for the Nerazzurri, as a strike of cameramen meant it was never filmed. It was "a beauty", according to Mariani, a player who always did things his own way.
Mariani loved his own unique style of play, but it was one that clashed with his responsibilities in terms of running and indeed with the determination of opposing defenders to break up his flow. In truth he didn’t score many goals, but somehow he was always destined to be remembered.
Case in point: during his spell at Cesena, who he joined from Inter, he was involved in the club’s first and only appearance in the UEFA Cup, which saw them drawn against FC Magdeburg in the Round of 32. Despite losing the first leg 3-0 in Germany, Cesena narrowly bowed out 4-3 on aggregate after a 3-1 home win in which Mariani once again showed the two sides to his coin, restoring hope with the opener before incurring a red card for a foul on striker Joachim Streich. Cesena went on to slump to relegation that same season, with Mariani bidding a temporary farewell to his native Emilia-Romagna as he joined Varese before returning to turn out for Carpi and later Sassuolo in Serie D.
It was a fitting homecoming for a player that had gone toe to toe with the great and good of the game during his career, including the legendary Jürgen Sparwasser in that European tie with FC Magdeburg. Nothing to be sniffed at for a youngster who started out in the humble Sassuolo neighbourhood of Braida. His local club remembers him as a player, a sporting director (before the club was bought out by Giorgio Suinzi) and a man capable of creating indelible memories – at both ends of the spectrum.
