Héctor "Ettore" Puricelli (; 15 September 1916 – 14 May 2001) was a

football Football is a family of team sports that involve, to varying degrees, kick (football), kicking a football (ball), ball to score a goal (sports), goal. Unqualified, football (word), the word ''football'' generally means the form of football t ...

player and manager who played as a striker. Born in Uruguay, he represented

Italy Italy, officially the Italian Republic, is a country in Southern Europe, Southern and Western Europe, Western Europe. It consists of Italian Peninsula, a peninsula that extends into the Mediterranean Sea, with the Alps on its northern land b ...

at international level. As a player, he is most famous for his time with Italian clubs

Bologna Bologna ( , , ; ; ) is the capital and largest city of the Emilia-Romagna region in northern Italy. It is the List of cities in Italy, seventh most populous city in Italy, with about 400,000 inhabitants and 150 different nationalities. Its M ...

and

Milan Milan ( , , ; ) is a city in northern Italy, regional capital of Lombardy, the largest city in Italy by urban area and the List of cities in Italy, second-most-populous city proper in Italy after Rome. The city proper has a population of nea ...

. A prolific goalscorer, he was known for his ability in the air, which earned him the nickname "testina d'oro" ("golden little head," in Italian).

Career

After playing for his hometown side

Central Español Central Español Fútbol Club, usually known simply as Central Español is a Uruguayan football club based in Montevideo. History The F.U.F era Together with Peñarol, Central founded FUF (Uruguayan football federation) in 1923 after being expel ...

from Montevideo, Puricelli decided to move from Uruguay to Italy in

1938 Events January * January 1 – state-owned enterprise, State-owned railway networks are created by merger, in France (SNCF) and the Netherlands (Nederlandse Spoorwegen – NS). * January 20 – King Farouk of Egypt marries Saf ...

to play for

Serie A The Serie A (), officially known as Serie A Enilive in Italy and Serie A Made in Italy abroad for sponsorship reasons, is a professional association football league in Italy and the highest tier of the Italian football league system. Establish ...

side

. The club were going through a good spell in their history and with goals from Puricelli they were able to continue that; in his first season they won the Italian championship of 1938–39. In his first season Puricelli was joint-'' capcannoniere'' (top scorer) in Serie A, along with

Aldo Boffi Aldo Boffi (; 26 February 1915 – 26 October 1987) was an Italian professional footballer who played as a striker. At club level, he played for Italian sides Seregno, AC Milan and Atalanta, and he represented the Italy national football team a ...

, with 19 goals. He repeated this feat in 1940–41 with 22 goals, also winning his second league title with Bologna that season. After

World War II World War II or the Second World War (1 September 1939 – 2 September 1945) was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War II, Allies and the Axis powers. World War II by country, Nearly all of the wo ...

, Puricelli joined Milan and although his goalscoring record continued in healthy fashion, the club did not capture the league championship; the nearest they came during this period was runners-up in 1947–48, serving as the team's

captain Captain is a title, an appellative for the commanding officer of a military unit; the supreme leader or highest rank officer of a navy ship, merchant ship, aeroplane, spacecraft, or other vessel; or the commander of a port, fire or police depa ...

. He ended his playing career with

Legnano Legnano (; or ''Lignàn'') is a town and ''comune'' (municipality) in the Metropolitan City of Milan, province of Milan, about from central Milan. With 60,259, it is the thirteenth-most populous township in Lombardy. Legnano is located in the ...

Serie B The Serie B (), officially known as Serie 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 season. It had b ...

still prolific in his goalscoring.

Honours

Player

Club

;Bologna *

: 1938–39, 1940–41

Individual

Capocannoniere The ''capocannoniere'' award (; ), known as Paolo Rossi Award since 2021, is awarded by the Italian Footballers' Association (AIC) to the highest goalscorer of each season in Italy's Serie A. From the 2010–11 season unti the change of denomina ...

: 1938–39, 1940–41

Manager

;A.C. Milan *

: 1954–55 *

Latin Cup The Latin Cup was an international official football tournament for club sides from the Southwest European nations of France, Italy, Spain, and Portugal. In 1949, the football federations came together and requested FIFA launch the competition ...

1956 Events January * January 1 – The Anglo-Egyptian Sudan, Anglo-Egyptian Condominium ends in Sudan after 57 years. * January 8 – Operation Auca: Five U.S. evangelical Christian Missionary, missionaries, Nate Saint, Roger Youderian, E ...

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Puricelli, Ettore 1916 births 2001 deaths Italian men's footballers Men's association football forwards Club Atlético River Plate (Montevideo) players Central Español players AC Milan players Bologna FC 1909 players AC Legnano players Serie A players Serie B players Italy men's international footballers Footballers from Montevideo Uruguayan men's footballers Uruguayan sportspeople of Italian descent Uruguayan football managers AC Milan managers Palermo FC managers FC Porto managers US Salernitana 1919 managers Atalanta BC managers US Alessandria Calcio 1912 managers Cagliari Calcio managers LR Vicenza managers Genoa CFC managers 20th-century Italian sportsmen 20th-century Uruguayan sportsmen