Carlo Nervo (; born 29 October 1971) is an Italian former professional

footballer A football player or footballer is a sportsperson who plays one of the different types of football. The main types of football are association football, American football, Canadian football, Australian rules football, Gaelic football, rugby le ...

who usually played as a wide

midfielder A midfielder is an outfield position in association football. Midfielders may play an exclusively defensive role, breaking up attacks, and are in that case known as defensive midfielders. As central midfielders often go across boundarie ...

on the right flank. Following his retirement, he began a career in politics.

Club career

Originally from Solagna, Nervo began his career with the G.S.R. Solagna Youth System, before moving to

Bassano Virtus Bassano Virtus 55 Soccer Team S.p.A., commonly known as Bassano Virtus or just Bassano is a football club based in Bassano del Grappa, Veneto. The first team of the club was relocated to Vicenza in 2018 as L.R. Vicenza Virtus, while the youth ...

, where he made his professional debut in 1988 after developing further in the club's Youth System. After brief periods with

Monza Monza (, ; lmo, label=Lombard language, Lombard, Monça, locally ; lat, Modoetia) is a city and ''comune'' on the River Lambro, a tributary of the Po River, Po in the Lombardy region of Italy, about north-northeast of Milan. It is the capit ...

and Cittadella, he moved to

Mantova Mantua ( ; it, Mantova ; Lombard and la, Mantua) is a city and ''comune'' in Lombardy, Italy, and capital of the province of the same name. In 2016, Mantua was designated as the Italian Capital of Culture. In 2017, it was named as the Europ ...

in 1992, spending two seasons with the club, helping the club to the

Serie C2 Lega Pro Seconda Divisione was the fourth highest football league in Italy, the lowest with a professional status. Usually it consisted of 36 teams, but in the 2011–12 season, there were 41 teams divided geographically into two divisions of 2 ...

title in his first season, and earning promotion to

Serie C1 Lega Pro Prima Divisione was the third highest football (soccer), football league in Italy. It consisted of 33 teams, divided geographically into two divisions of 16 and 17 teams for group A and B respectively. Until 2008 it was known as Serie C1 ...

. In 1994, Nervo was signed by

Bologna Bologna (, , ; egl, label= Emilian, Bulåggna ; lat, Bononia) is the capital and largest city of the Emilia-Romagna region in Northern Italy. It is the seventh most populous city in Italy with about 400,000 inhabitants and 150 different nat ...

, the club with which he would spend most of his career; in total, he remained at the club for 13 seasons in total, 11 of which were consecutive, making 337 league appearances for the club between

Serie A The Serie A (), also called Serie A TIM for national sponsorship with TIM, is a professional league competition for football clubs located at the top of the Italian football league system and the winner is awarded the Scudetto and the Coppa ...

Serie B The Serie B (), currently named Serie Balkrishna Industries, BKT for sponsorship reasons, is the second-highest division in the Italian football league system after the Serie A. It has been operating for over ninety years since the 1929–30 ...

, and Serie C1, while scoring a total of 36 goals; he made his debut with Bologna during the 1994–95 season, and demonstrated his adeptness as a right winger due to his pace, work-rate, skill, creativity, and eye for goal, which enabled him to form several notable partnerships on the pitch with strikers such as

Igor Kolyvanov Igor Vladimirovich Kolyvanov (russian: Игорь Владимирович Колыванов; born 6 March 1968) is a Russian football manager and a former player. He is the manager of Tekstilshchik Ivanovo. During his playing career, he playe ...

and

Giuseppe Signori Giuseppe "Beppe" Signori (; born 17 February 1968) is an Italian former professional footballer who played as a forward. He played for several clubs in Italy throughout his career, and also had spells in Greece and Hungary with Iraklis Thessal ...

. Nervo played a key role in helping Bologna win consecutive Serie C1 and Serie B titles, also gaining

promotion with the club, and he made his Serie A debut on 7 September 1996, in a 1–0 home win over

Lazio it, Laziale , population_note = , population_blank1_title = , population_blank1 = , demographics_type1 = , demographics1_footnotes = , demographics1_title1 = , demographics1_info1 = , demographics1_title2 ...

; he made his 100th Serie A appearance with Bologna in a 0–0 away draw against

Verona Verona ( , ; vec, Verona or ) is a city on the Adige River in Veneto, Northern Italy, Italy, with 258,031 inhabitants. It is one of the seven provincial capitals of the region. It is the largest city Comune, municipality in the region and the ...

on 5 March 2000. During his time with the club, he helped Bologna to qualify for the

UEFA Cup A cup is an open-top used to hold hot or cold liquids for pouring or drinking; while mainly used for drinking, it also can be used to store Solid, solids for pouring (e.g., sugar, flour, grains, salt). Cups may be made of glass, metal, porcela ...

, after winning the

1998 UEFA Intertoto Cup The 1998 UEFA Intertoto Cup finals were won by Valencia, Werder Bremen, and Bologna. All three teams advanced to the UEFA Cup. The 1998 tournament saw Spanish clubs debut in the competition and also the return of English clubs, since the controve ...

; Bologna reached the semifinals of both the

1998–99 UEFA Cup The 1998–99 UEFA Cup was won by Parma in the final against Marseille. It was their second title in the competition. It was the last edition of the old format UEFA Cup, before the Cup Winners' Cup was merged into it to include domestic cup winn ...

and the

1998–99 Coppa Italia The 1998–99 Coppa Italia was the 52nd edition of the tournament, which began on August 23, 1998 and ended on May 5, 1999. Parma won the 1998–99 Coppa Italia tournament for the 2nd time in club history and first since the 1991–92 competition. ...

the following season. Following Bologna's relegation to Serie B at the conclusion of the

2004–05 Serie A The 2004–05 Serie A (known as the Serie A TIM for sponsorship reasons) was the 103rd season of top-tier Italian football, the 73rd in a round-robin tournament. It was expanded to contain 20 clubs, which played 38 matches against each other, ra ...

season and the expiration of his contract with the club, Nervo spent a brief stint on loan with fellow Serie B side Catanzaro during the 2005–06 season, but later returned to Bologna in January 2006, and finished his professional career with the club at the conclusion of the 2006–07 season, retiring in 2007. With 417 appearances in official competitions with Bologna, he is the club's third highest appearance holder, behind

Giacomo Bulgarelli Giacomo Bulgarelli (; 24 October 1940 – 12 February 2009) was an Italian international footballer who played as a midfielder. Regarded as one of Italy's greatest ever midfielders, Bulgarelli spent his entire club career with Italian side Bologna ...

and Tazio Roversi. In February 2008, Nervo came out of retirement to play football in the lower divisions, for Virgilio, and Padania. During the 2008–09 season, he played with Rolo, officially retiring from football at the end of the season.

International career

Nervo also played for the Italy national side, making six appearances under manager Giovanni Trapattoni between 2002 and 2004. He made his international debut in a friendly match on 20 November 2002, in a 1–1 home draw against

Turkey Turkey ( tr, Türkiye ), officially the Republic of Türkiye ( tr, Türkiye Cumhuriyeti, links=no ), is a list of transcontinental countries, transcontinental country located mainly on the Anatolia, Anatolian Peninsula in Western Asia, with ...

, in Pescara.

Style of play

Nervo usually played as a right winger, and was known for his pace, work-rate, dribbling skills, creativity, eye for goal, and ability to provide precise assists for teammates from

crosses Crosses may refer to: * Cross, the symbol Geography * Crosses, Cher, a French municipality * Crosses, Arkansas, a small community located in the Ozarks of north west Arkansas Language * Crosses, a truce term used in East Anglia and Lincolnshire ...

. Although he usually played as a midfielder, he was also capable of playing as a

forward Forward is a relative direction, the opposite of backward. Forward may also refer to: People * Forward (surname) Sports * Forward (association football) * Forward (basketball), including: ** Point forward ** Power forward (basketball) ** Sm ...

, or as a defender.

Outside of football

Politics

Following his retirement from football, Nervo pursued a career in politics; he is a member of the controversial

right-wing Right-wing politics describes the range of political ideologies that view certain social orders and hierarchies as inevitable, natural, normal, or desirable, typically supporting this position on the basis of natural law, economics, authorit ...

Padanian separatist party ''

Lega Nord Lega Nord (; acronym: LN), whose complete name is (), is a right-wing, federalist, populist and conservative political party in Italy. In the run-up of the 2018 general election, the party was rebranded as (), without changing its official n ...

''. On 7 June 2009, he was elected the mayor of

Solagna Solagna is a town in the province of Vicenza, Veneto, north-eastern Italy. It is east of SS47 state road. Sights include the church of Santa Giustina, with artworks by Brustolon and Giuseppe Ghedina; it also houses the alleged tomb of Ezzelino II d ...

, in the province of Vicenza.

Business

After his political career, Nervo started a family furniture business.

Honours

;

: 1992–93 ;

: 1994–95 *

: 1995–96 *

UEFA Intertoto Cup The UEFA Intertoto Cup (from la, Inter, 'between' + german: toto, 'betting pool'),Most precisely, from (football pool); cf. often abbreviated and more known in the German-speaking world as UI Cup and originally called the International Foot ...

1998 1998 was designated as the ''International Year of the Ocean''. Events January * January 6 – The '' Lunar Prospector'' spacecraft is launched into orbit around the Moon, and later finds evidence for frozen water, in soil in permanently ...

References

External links

*
Biography
*
FIGC Profile
{{DEFAULTSORT:Nervo, Carlo 1971 births Living people Italian men's footballers Italy men's international footballers Serie A players Serie B players Serie C players Bologna FC 1909 players US Catanzaro 1929 players Mantova 1911 players AC Monza players AS Cittadella players Bassano Virtus 55 ST players Men's association football midfielders Footballers from Vicenza