Rodney Strasser (born 30 March 1990) is a Sierra Leonean 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, rugb ...

who plays as a

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 ...

Club career

Milan

Born in

Freetown Freetown is the Capital city, capital and largest city of Sierra Leone. It is a major port city on the Atlantic Ocean and is located in the Western Area of the country. Freetown is Sierra Leone's major urban, economic, financial, cultural, educ ...

, Strasser began his career at local club Kallon, before moving to Italy to join

Milan Milan ( , , Lombard: ; it, Milano ) is a city in northern Italy, capital of Lombardy, and the second-most populous city proper in Italy after Rome. The city proper has a population of about 1.4 million, while its metropolitan city ...

in 2007. During his time in Milan's youth system, he was a member of the under-20 side, who won the 2009–10

Coppa Italia Primavera The Coppa Italia Primavera ( Italian for Spring Italian Cup) is an Italian football competition played by youth teams from Campionato Primavera. All players are under 20 of age. The first edition was held in the 1972–73 season. Due to sponsorsh ...

. He made his first-team debut on 21 December 2008, in a 5–1 win against

Udinese Udinese Calcio, commonly referred to as Udinese, is a professional Italian football club based in Udine, Friuli-Venezia Giulia, that currently plays in Serie A. It was founded on 30 November 1896 as a sports club, and on 5 July 1911 as a ...

, coming on as a substitute for

Kakha Kaladze Kakhaber "Kakha" Kaladze ( ka, კახაბერ (კახა) კალაძე, ; born 27 February 1978) is a Georgian politician and former footballer who serves as the Mayor of Tbilisi since November 2017. A versatile player, he was ...

in the 82nd minute.

Genoa

On 20 July 2010, Milan announced that half of the rights to Strasser had been purchased by

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

for €2.25 million, as part of the deal that saw defender

Sokratis Papastathopoulos Sokratis Papastathopoulos ( el, Σωκράτης Παπασταθόπουλος; born 7 June 1988), commonly known mononymously as Sokratis, is a Greek professional footballer who plays as a centre-back for Super League club Olympiacos. Club ca ...

move to Milan. Strasser, however, would stay at Milan on loan, joining the first-team squad permanently. His first appearance of the season was in a

UEFA Champions League The UEFA Champions League (abbreviated as UCL, or sometimes, UEFA CL) is an annual club football competition organised by the Union of European Football Associations (UEFA) and contested by top-division European clubs, deciding the competi ...

group stage 2–0 win against

Auxerre Auxerre ( , ) is the capital of the Yonne department and the fourth-largest city in Burgundy. Auxerre's population today is about 35,000; the urban area (''aire d'attraction'') comprises roughly 113,000 inhabitants. Residents of Auxerre are r ...

– which also marked his debut in European club competition – on 23 November. He went on to score his first professional goal in a 1–0

league League or The League may refer to: Arts and entertainment * ''Leagues'' (band), an American rock band * ''The League'', an American sitcom broadcast on FX and FXX about fantasy football Sports * Sports league * Rugby league, full contact footba ...

win over

Cagliari Cagliari (, also , , ; sc, Casteddu ; lat, Caralis) is an Italian municipality and the capital of the island of Sardinia, an autonomous region of Italy. Cagliari's Sardinian name ''Casteddu'' means ''castle''. It has about 155,000 inhabitant ...

, on 6 January.

Milan return

In May 2011, his co-ownership was dissolved in favour of Milan for the same price and renewed his contract to June 2016. (with Papastathopoulos moved back to Genoa), but Strasser subsequently joined

Lecce Lecce ( ); el, label= Griko, Luppìu, script=Latn; la, Lupiae; grc, Λουπίαι, translit=Loupíai), group=pron is a historic city of 95,766 inhabitants (2015) in southern Italy. It is the capital of the province of Lecce, the provi ...

on loan. He appeared in 13 games and scored one goal for his new team, before suffering a broken ankle in a game against

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

on 9 January and subsequently being called back to Milan to undergo rehabilitation. He made his return on 10 April, coming on as a substitute in the second half of a game against

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 ...

, which Milan won 1–0. At the start of the following season, Strasser sustained another injury which would rule him out for three months. After recovering he struggled to get playing time, making only one Coppa Italia appearance before being loaned out to

Parma Parma (; egl, Pärma, ) is a city in the northern Italian region of Emilia-Romagna known for its architecture, music, art, prosciutto (ham), cheese and surrounding countryside. With a population of 198,292 inhabitants, Parma is the second m ...

during the January transfer window.

Genoa return

On 27 July 2013, Strasser joined Genoa on a permanent deal for €3.5 million, as part of

Kévin Constant Kévin Constant (born 10 May 1987) is a former professional footballer who played as a midfielder or left back. Having come through the Toulouse youth system, he left for LB Châteauroux in 2008. He moved to Italy in 2010 playing for Chievo, Geno ...

's co-ownership resolution in favour of Milan for €6 million. Strasser was loaned out to

Serie B The Serie B (), currently named 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 been ...

team

Reggina Reggina 1914 S.r.l., commonly referred to as Reggina, is an Italian football club based in Reggio Calabria. Founded in 1914, they currently play in Serie B, and play their home matches at the 27,763 seater Stadio Oreste Granillo. They are ni ...

in August 2013. As of January 2019, Strasser played for the Serie D team Villafranc

International career

Strasser made his international debut for the Sierra Leone national football team, Sierra Leone national team on 5 September 2010, in a

2012 Africa Cup of Nations qualification This page details the process of the 2012 Africa Cup of Nations qualification phase. Forty-six African nations, including hosts Gabon and Equatorial Guinea, entered the competition. Gabon and Equatorial Guinea automatically qualified as host count ...

game against

Egypt Egypt ( ar, مصر , ), officially the Arab Republic of Egypt, is a List of transcontinental countries, transcontinental country spanning the North Africa, northeast corner of Africa and Western Asia, southwest corner of Asia via a land bridg ...

Career statistics

Club

. ¹European competitions include the

and 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 solids for pouring (e.g., sugar, flour, grains, salt). Cups may be made of glass, metal, china, clay ...

.
²Other tournaments include none to date.

International

Honours

;Milan *

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 Cop ...

2010–11 1 (one, unit, unity) is a number representing a single or the only entity. 1 is also a numerical digit and represents a single unit of counting or measurement. For example, a line segment of ''unit length'' is a line segment of length 1. ...

References

External links

*
Rodney Strasser
at aic.football.it * {{DEFAULTSORT:Strasser, Rodney 1990 births Living people Sierra Leone Creole people Sportspeople from Freetown Sierra Leonean footballers Sierra Leonean expatriate footballers Sierra Leone international footballers A.C. Milan players U.S. Lecce players Parma Calcio 1913 players Genoa C.F.C. players Reggina 1914 players S.S. Racing Club Roma players NK Zagreb players Gil Vicente F.C. players A.S.D. Villafranca players Turun Palloseura footballers Serie A players Serie B players Serie C players Serie D players Croatian Football League players Liga Portugal 2 players Veikkausliiga players Sierra Leonean expatriate sportspeople in Italy Sierra Leonean expatriate sportspeople in Finland Sierra Leonean expatriate sportspeople in Portugal Expatriate footballers in Italy Expatriate footballers in Croatia Expatriate footballers in Finland Expatriate footballers in Portugal Association football midfielders