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by ILONA SCHERER,
a sports writer for the German daily paper Die Welt in Berlin.
Argentina's Gabriel Batistuta is rated one of the best strikers in the world. Now 31 years old he has just been transferred from AC Fiorentina to AS Roma. In this interview he talks about his life in Italy, about Diego Maradona, and his love of airplanes.
FIFA Magazine: Your transfer to AS Roma cost the club something like USD 35 million, so they will be expecting a lot of goals from you in return. How do you feel about this kind of pressure?
Gabriel Batistuta: If AS Roma are prepared to invest that kind of money in me then it shows that the club is convinced that I can help the team. It is not as if Roma are asking me to do something that I cannot do. I am quite calm about the situation. In the end you win as a team or you lose as a team. That's the way I look at it and I don't feel any pressure - none at all.
For nine years you remained true to AC Fiorentina, and even suffered relegation with them in 1993. Why did you choose this year as the time for a transfer?
I stayed too long in Florence and I felt a desire to do something different. Things were too much the same, including the officials?
There have been a lot of anecdotes about Fiorentina president Vittorio Cecchi Gori; he is reputed - to put it mildly - to be a very temperamental character.
The president is not a bad man, but he has a different perspective on football from me, different aims, a different idea about how a team wins matches. So we slowly drifted in opposite directions. He eventually made me not want to stay in Florence and so I made the change - for the better, I hope.
The player who will take your place in Florence - the young Portuguese striker Nuno Gomes - will have a hard act to follow there.
I think that way too; the expectations on him will be very high. I do not know Nuno but I would advise him not to try to copy me. Everyone has his own personality and nobody can be like anyone else.
Outside of Argentina, Italy is the only country you have played in. Why did you not think of moving to Spain or England - the offers were there?
Because Italian football is very demand-ing. Lasting ten years in the Serie A is not easy. I could have gone to Spain, to Barcelona or Real Madrid, and won titles with them, but that would have been fairly routine - those clubs win everything. The same would have been true for Manchester United, they are dominant in England. Things are different in Italy; here it is hard to win the title if you are not Juventus or AC Milan.
Yet with Fiorentina you never did achieve that aim.
No, I didn't make it, but I am satisfied all the same - at least we tried.
Does AS Roma look to have a better chance in your opinion?
Yes. I hope so at least. Roma is a club that has a major project in progress. Here they want to win. It is always important to have this aim.
Last season in the Serie A there were a lot of incidents between the fans. In the end the football association had to introduce a ruling, which was backed by the government, that a game can be stopped if there is trouble amongst the fans. Doesn't this kind of development give you something to think about?
Unfortunately there are a lot of people who go into the football stadiums at the weekend to unload the week's frustration. Then things become difficult. But in Italy a lot is being done to combat this trend; they are on the right track to prevent such behaviour in the future. Up until now it has not been necessary to invoke that ruling, but the possibility is there and that is important. I think that people will now think twice before they start to cause problems. As professionals we too must set a good example on the pitch and demonstrate that football is still only a game, even if there are so many interests involved.
The recent EUR0 2000 turned out to be a tournament that produced some high
quality football. Did you watch any of the matches?
I saw the last ten minutes of the final. But normally I do not watch football on television; I don't enjoy it. I much prefer to play myself.
At 31 you have just signed a three-year contract - will this be your last one?
I used to say that 30 would be the end for me. But now? I feel fit and well and think that as long as that feeling lasts I can continue to play football. I don't really know; probably it will be my last contract.
It is important to realise when the time has come to stop playing and to take that decision.
Yes, but it is not easy to tell when that time has come. While you still feel fit it is hard to say, yes, I will pack it in now and give up a game that has been great fun and which you have played with passion. But I am prepared and I know I am not a youngster any more. At 31 I am aware that the end could come from one day to the next, that a serious injury could occur. But whatever happens I have had a great career.
And been in some odd situations, like being kept out of the national team for a full year by Daniel Passarella because you refused to have your hair cut. How do you see that incident now?
I told the coach at the time; in my opinion it was a totally unnecessary measure. Whether my hair has been short or long I have always scored goals and always had a positive image. A couple of centimetres more or less does not make much difference. But the coach had his own view of things and in the end I had to accept his decision.
Now that your career is nearing an end, do you have any desire to play in Argentina again?
No, I don't think so. When my contract in Rome runs out I will stop playing altogether.
You have been playing away from your homeland for nine years now. Do your miss your own country?
I have often been back to play with the national team in Argentina, but I only really go home about once a year. Maybe twice if I am lucky. But I am grown up now and have my own family?
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You are also engaged in the battle against drugs. The Maradona affair must have been a big shock to you?
People in Argentina are not cross with Diego, just sorry for him. But sadly drugs are becoming more and more a part of the scene. And their effects are terrible. To see Diego suffering really hurts me. I call him now and then but it has become harder and harder; he is always changing his number or he does not answer the phone because journalists are for ever ringing him up.
Maradona said recently that he has no regrets about scoring that goal against England in 1986 with his hand?
At least he's honest, even though perhaps he should not have said it. Maybe what he did was a bad example, because he was cheating. But that is football; the winner is always the one who is smarter than the other. And at that moment it seemed to him the right thing to do, and that goal made him happy. Me too, and all the other fans in Argentina. I was very young at the time, but even today I do not condemn him for what he did.
Argentina is in the middle of the qualifying matches for the FIFA World Cup Korea/Japan 2002. How do you rate your team's chances?
I hope that I will be there in just over two year's time, because I think that Argentina can win the title. We have a great team and I am already dreaming of holding up the trophy in my hands.
You obtained a pilot's licence in the summer and now you fly quite a bit. Don't accidents like the recent one with Concorde scare you a bit?
Oh, no. You hear so much about road accidents and flying is much the same. I fly very carefully. An accident could just as easily happen in a car. Now that I know the technical side of an airplane I am quite cool about the whole business.
You made it a condition of this interview that no photos would be taken?
Because I do not like having to pose. I do not feel happy posing for the camera.
Have you ever thought about getting your hair cut short?
It was short at one time and my wife liked it much more that way. But I prefer long hair - I can hide my face better, that's the reason.
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