Italy coach Luciano Spalletti banned the use of PlayStation during Euro 2024, but which Italian footballers play video games regularly?
Italy will travel to Germany in the summer to defend their European champion status, and Spalletti has warned his players that they won’t be allowed to use PlayStation during their free time.
“From now on they leave their PlayStations at home and no longer bring them,” the Azzurri boss told Gazzetta in February.
“I’ll invent a little game for them to think about to distract themselves at night. They come to me, and I give them homework to do in the evening if the daytime homework isn’t enough. Because in the national team, you stay on track, concentrate, don’t mess around.”
As revealed by ExpressVPN many athletes, including footballers, are massive video gamers, but which Italian footballers regularly use PlayStation in their free time?
If we look at players who have a chance to be called up for the upcoming Euros, it’s impossible not to mention Lazio captain Ciro Immobile. The experienced striker loves playing football video games, and his wife, Jessica, often jokes about this on social media.
Milan defender Alessandro Florenzi is also a gamer. Sky Sport Italia had revealed that a few years ago when the Milan defender was playing for Italy U21, he bought a 36″ TV as the screens inside the Azzurri’s hotel rooms were unsuitable for playing video games. Florenzi even played PlayStation with his new TV at an airport because Italy U21’s flight was late.
Gianluigi Donnarumma often played with his brother Antonio at Milan. Sometimes he still posts videos on Instagram while using PlayStation or portable consoles.
Don’t think that only young generations of footballers play video games. Italy World Cup winners Alessandro Nesta and Andrea Pirlo loved playing video games and would often play 1v1 as the online mode was still unavailable in the early 2000s.
Pirlo once revealed that he and Nesta used to eat as quickly as possible so they could return to their hotel rooms to play for as long as they could.
Rumours back then suggested Nesta even suffered a tendon injury to his thumb because of excessive video game time, but the ex-Milan, Lazio, and Italy defender denied it during an interview with La Repubblica newspaper a few years ago.
“It’s true that I used to play so much that I could spend hours in front of the TV, challenging my teammates, or even alone at home. But in that case, it was different. I had hurt myself in a Champions League game, a tendon injury, all documented. The recovery was slower than expected, so somebody put this story out. I still get upset when I think about it.” Spalletti’s men surely won’t face the same problem this summer.
