Corrado Grabbi (born 29 July 1975) 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 played 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 ...

. He was nicknamed "Ciccio" throughout his career. He is currently under contract with

Juventus Juventus Football Club (from la, iuventūs, 'youth'; ), colloquially known as Juve (), is a professional Association football, football club based in Turin, Piedmont, Italy, that competes in the Serie A, the top tier of the Italian football leagu ...

as a Under-15 youth

coach Coach may refer to: Guidance/instruction * Coach (sport), a director of athletes' training and activities * Coaching, the practice of guiding an individual through a process ** Acting coach, a teacher who trains performers Transportation * Co ...

Playing career

Early career

Born in

Turin Turin ( , Piedmontese language, Piedmontese: ; it, Torino ) is a city and an important business and cultural centre in Northern Italy. It is the capital city of Piedmont and of the Metropolitan City of Turin, and was the first Italian capital ...

, Grabbi began his career with the

youth team. He is also the grandson of former Juventus player Giuseppe Grabbi. He was later promoted to the first team and scored on his debut against

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

, in one of his total two appearances in the 1994–95 season. Unable to break into the team, because of his young age and the contemporary explosion of

Alessandro Del Piero Alessandro Del Piero (; born 9 November 1974) is an Italian former professional footballer who mainly played as a deep-lying forward, although he was capable of playing in several offensive positions. Since 2015, he has worked as a pundit fo ...

, he was loaned to Lucchese (76 games, 8 goals) and then

Chievo Chievo (4,500 inhabitants) is a frazione of Verona located to the west of the city, around from the historic city centre, on the shores of the river Adige. It is best known for its football team, A.C. ChievoVerona, which competes in the second ...

(18 games, 2 goals) before switching to

Modena Modena (, , ; egl, label=Emilian language#Dialects, Modenese, Mòdna ; ett, Mutna; la, Mutina) is a city and ''comune'' (municipality) on the south side of the Po Valley, in the Province of Modena in the Emilia-Romagna region of northern I ...

. There he found some real form, scoring 30 times in 58 appearances. This performance saw him signed by

Ternana Ternana Calcio, commonly referred to as Ternana, is an Italian football club based in Terni, Umbria. The club was founded in 1925 and refounded in 1993. In its history, Ternana has twice played in Serie A (in the 1972–73 and 1974–75 seas ...

, where he played for one season before been loaned to

Ravenna Ravenna ( , , also ; rgn, Ravèna) is the capital city of the Province of Ravenna, in the Emilia-Romagna region of Northern Italy. It was the capital city of the Western Roman Empire from 408 until its collapse in 476. It then served as the cap ...

where he scored 13 goals. When he returned to Ternana he became a regular scorer again, with 20 goals in 34 games and became idol for the local supporters, who still remember him as the best player to ever have played for Ternana.

Blackburn Rovers

Grabbi's prolific season with Ternana saw him attract attention of various Serie A clubs, including Udinese and AC Milan. But apparently

Luciano Moggi Luciano Moggi ( born 10 July 1937) is a former Italian association football administrator. He was a club executive for A.S. Roma, Roma, S.S. Lazio, Lazio, Torino F.C., Torino, S.S.C. Napoli, Napoli, and Juventus, leading them to win six leagues ...

of Juventus, who had previously pressured Grabbi to change his agent and join

GEA World GEA World S.p.A. is a consultancy company with offices in Rome, Dubai and London, operating in sports business industry. Alessandro Moggi is its president in partnership with Franco Zavaglia, Riccardo Calleri and Ivan Vecchietti. In January 2013, ...

with no success, made it impossible for Ciccio to play in Italy, so in 2001 he was signed by

Blackburn Rovers Blackburn Rovers Football Club is a professional football club, based in Blackburn, Lancashire, England, which competes in the , the second tier of the English football league system. They have played home matches at Ewood Park since 1890. T ...

for a record fee of £6.75 million in July

2001 The September 11 attacks against the United States by Al-Qaeda, which Casualties of the September 11 attacks, killed 2,977 people and instigated the global war on terror, were a defining event of 2001. The United States led a Participants in ...

, but due to injuries and personal reasons, he failed to repeat this progress, scoring just once in fourteen league games, his goal coming in a 1–0 win over Everton. He scored once more before going on loan to Messina, in the FA Cup against Barnsley. Leaving the club on loan meant he missed out on their victory in the 2002 League Cup Final. Grabbi's move to Blackburn is widely regarded as one of the worst transfers in the history of the Premier League. In the same interview, Grabbi stated that the only person who he became friends with in this time was

Tugay Kerimoğlu Tugay Kerimoğlu (born 24 August 1970) is a Turkish former professional footballer who played as a midfielder. He spent the majority of his career for Galatasaray and Blackburn Rovers; winning silverware at Rangers F.C. in-between. He was the coo ...

. Despite his unsuccessful spell at Blackburn Rovers, Grabbi still has a cult following with fans of the club. During a loan spell back in Italy with

Messina Messina (, also , ) is a harbour city and the capital of the Italian Metropolitan City of Messina. It is the third largest city on the island of Sicily, and the 13th largest city in Italy, with a population of more than 219,000 inhabitants in ...

, he scored two goals in the final game of the season and saved Messina from relegation. Upon his return to England, he failed to reignite his form, and after a further 16 games and three goals (against Liverpool in the league, CSKA Sofia in the UEFA Cup and Walsall in the League Cup) with Blackburn, who had in the meantime signed ex-Manchester United strikers

Dwight Yorke Dwight Eversley Yorke CM (born 3 November 1971) is a Trinidadian and Tobagonian former professional footballer and current manager of Australian A-League club Macarthur FC. Throughout his club career, he played for Aston Villa, Manchester Unit ...

and

Andy Cole Andrew Alexander Cole (born 15 October 1971) is an English former professional footballer who played as a striker. His professional career lasted from 1988 to 2008, and is mostly remembered for his time with Manchester United, who paid a Briti ...

, he was allowed to return to Italy permanently with

Ancona Ancona (, also , ) is a city and a seaport in the Marche region in central Italy, with a population of around 101,997 . Ancona is the capital of the province of Ancona and of the region. The city is located northeast of Rome, on the Adriatic S ...

in 2004.

Later career

After spending one year without a team, trying to recover from the injury caused by a rare form of foot disease (Leveraus Morb) which had afflicted him for the past three seasons, he joined

Genoa Genoa ( ; it, Genova ; lij, Zêna ). is the capital of the Italian region of Liguria and the List of cities in Italy, sixth-largest city in Italy. In 2015, 594,733 people lived within the city's administrative limits. As of the 2011 Italian ce ...

Serie C The Serie C () is the third-highest division in the Italian football league system after the Serie B and Serie A. The Lega Italiana Calcio Professionistico (Lega Pro) is the governing body that runs the Serie C. The unification of the Lega Pro ...

1/A in September 2005. With his new team, he gained promotion to Serie B on playoffs scoring 9 goals in 25 games. Club president

Enrico Preziosi Enrico Preziosi is an Italian entrepreneur. He runs a number of businesses and is most famous for have been the chairman ( it, presidente) of football club Genoa. Toys Preziosi is the chairman ( it, presidente) of the board of directors of Gioch ...

decided then that Genoa did not need Grabbi anymore, so during the 2007 winter transfer window, Grabbi signed for

Arezzo Arezzo ( , , ) , also ; ett, 𐌀𐌓𐌉𐌕𐌉𐌌, Aritim. is a city and ''comune'' in Italy and the capital of the province of the same name located in Tuscany. Arezzo is about southeast of Florence at an elevation of above sea level. ...

, still in

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 ...

, after having never made a single appearance in the first half of the season for Genoa. After relegation with Arezzo, scoring no goals, Grabbi signed a contract with

AC Bellinzona AC Bellinzona is a Swiss football club based in Bellinzona. It was founded in 1904, and won the Swiss Super League in 1948. After being folded in 2013 declaring bankruptcy, the team played the Ticino Group of 2.Liga, the sixth tier of the Swi ...

, a team from the

Swiss Challenge League The Challenge League is the second-highest tier of the Swiss football league system and lower of two professional leagues in the country. Ten teams play in the Challenge League; the winners of the league are promoted to the Super League, while the ...

(second division). Ciccio scored the winning goal (his first after more than one year) in the Swiss Cup game Bellinzona-Gossau: 2–

Grabbi was also directly involved in the

Calciopoli ''Calciopoli'' () was a sports scandal in Italy's top professional association football league Serie A and to a lesser extent Serie B. Involving various clubs and numerous executives, both from the same clubs and from the main Italian football b ...

scandal of summer 2006 as a victim: It was in fact only then that Ciccio could tell the media what Luciano Moggi had done to affect his career: after Ciccio Grabbi had refused to drop his agent in favour of Luciano Moggi's son, Moggi told him "''you will never play football again, if not in my garden!''" Grabbi was propriety of Juventus until he was sold to Ternana.

Coaching career

After retirement, Grabbi took on a coaching career, joining his former playing team

as a youth coach in 2009. Among all the players he trained as a youth coach from his early years in the ''Pulcini'' category, Grabbi also worked with Italian international

Moise Kean Bioty Moise Kean (, ; born 28 February 2000) is an Italian professional Association football, footballer who plays as a Forward (association football), forward for Serie A club Juventus F.C., Juventus and the Italy national football team, Italy ...

Honours

Club

Juventus *

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 ...

: 1994–95 *

Coppa Italia The ("Italy Cup") is an annual knockout cup competition in Italian football organized by the FIGC until the 2009–10 season and the Lega Serie A ever since. History The beginning of the tournament was turbulent, due to the complexity of ...

: 1994–95 Blackburn Rovers *

League Cup In several sports, most prominently association football, a league cup or secondary cup generally signifies a cup competition for which entry is restricted only to teams in a particular league. The first national association football tournament t ...

: 2001–02

References

Websites

*http://www.acbellinzona.ch *http://corradograbbi.blogspot.com/ {{DEFAULTSORT:Grabbi, Corrado 1975 births Living people Footballers from Turin Association football forwards Italian footballers Juventus F.C. players S.S.D. Lucchese 1905 players A.C. ChievoVerona players Modena F.C. players Ternana Calcio players Ravenna F.C. players Blackburn Rovers F.C. players A.C.R. Messina players A.C. Ancona players Genoa C.F.C. players S.S. Arezzo players AC Bellinzona players Premier League players Serie A players Serie B players Expatriate footballers in England Expatriate footballers in Switzerland Italian expatriate sportspeople in Switzerland Italian expatriate sportspeople in England Italian expatriate footballers Italian football managers