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Luigi "Gigi" Meroni (24 February 1943 – 15 October 1967) was an Italian professional footballer who played as a winger. He died at the age of 24, shortly after the end of a match between Torino, the team to which he belonged, and Sampdoria, hit by a car while crossing Corso Re Umberto in Turin with his friend and teammate Fabrizio Poletti. He played 145 matches in Serie A, scoring 29 goals. ==Club career== Meroni began playing football in a small courtyard of 60 square meters, and then moved to the field of the Oratorio di San Bartolomeo in Como. From the age of two he had lost his father, and his mother Rosa, a professional weaver, had financial difficulties raising three children: Celestino, Luigi (called Luigino, then Gigi) and Maria. His first job was as a designer of silk neckties, he also devoted himself to painting.〔 His football career began in the Como youth sector, where he also made his debut for the first team, albeit in the second division. He was then sold to Genoa. In the shadow of the ''Lanterna'', Meroni had moments of great notoriety. The "magic" threatened to crack on the last match of the season, when Meroni refused to undergo examinations for doping control, saying that he had forgotten the test in a hotel. Three other players tested positive for amphetamines and Meroni was suspended for the first five rounds of Serie A in 1963.〔 In 1964, despite the discontent of the Genoa fans, Meroni was sold to Torino, a team coached by Nereo Rocco and on the rise after the decline following the tragedy of Superga. The transfer fee was 300 million lira, a record at the time for a player of only 21 years of age.〔 He was nicknamed the "butterfly", with reference to his style of play and anticonformist outfits (he was notorious for his cohabitation as husband and wife with a young divorcee, Cristiana Uderstadt), and the "beatnik del gol" (the beatnik of football) for his artistic interests and hippie lifestyle.〔 Along with striker Nestor Combin, he formed a successful attacking partnership, preceding the glorious attacking partnership of Paolo Pulici and Francesco Graziani at Torino years later.〔 Rumors of his move to Juventus, for an offer of 750 million lire, triggered a sort of "crisis" and then popular Torino president Orfeo Pianelli, under the pressure of the fans, declined.〔 In 1967 at San Siro, after one of his famous dribbles, he lobbed the ball from the edge of box into the top corner of the goal, interrupting the unbeaten home run of the "Grande Inter" of Helenio Herrera, forcing Inter Milan to be defeated after three years of positive results.〔 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Gigi Meroni」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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