Fabio Cannavaro
| ● The file | |
|---|---|
| Born | 1973, Naples, Italy |
| Golden Ball | 2006 |
| World Cup 2006 | Captain; 2 goals conceded in 7 games |
| Height | 1.76m — the shortest great centre-back of the era |
Cannavaro's 2006 was the Ballon d'Or's only defensive coup of the century's first decade: Italy winning the World Cup in Berlin with a defence that conceded two goals in seven games (an own goal and a penalty), marshalled by a centre-back of 1.76 metres who won every aerial duel the tournament could stage against him. The calendar year's scandal at home — Calciopoli breaking that summer, Juventus stripped and relegated — made the national team's triumph a whole country's redemption, and Cannavaro its face.
The award's second defender after Sammer's decade-earlier sweep, and the last defender to win it, his candidacy rests on the oldest truth in football: that a great defence is one man's certainty transmitted to ten others. Real Madrid followed, the legs lasted two more World Cups, and the memory of Berlin — Cannavaro rising, again, over a taller forward, again — remains the award's purest image of structure beating size.