Claudio Caniggia (born January 9, 1967 in Buenos Aires) is
a former Argentine football (soccer) striker, a mainstay in the
Argentine national team throughout the early 1990s.
On the club level, El P�jaro (The Bird) Caniggia played for
River Plate (1985-88), Hellas Verona (1988-89), Atalanta
(1989-92 and 1999-2000), AS Roma (1992-93), Benfica (1994-95),
Boca Juniors (1995-98), Dundee (2000-01) and Rangers (2001-03).
For Argentina, Caniggia was capped 50 times, scoring 16 goals.
Most of these caps came in the early 1990s, as he played for his
country at the 1990 and 1994 World Cups. A refusal to cut his
long hair despite the rules of national coach Daniel Passarella
and a resulting prolonged absense from the national team
followed. He made a brief comeback to the Marcelo Bielsa-coached
squad for the 2002 World Cup, but did not play a minute.
Nevertheless he did receive a red card for swearing at the
referee from the bench in Argentina's last match against Sweden.
Caniggia is great friends with Argentine superstar Diego
Maradona; the duo celebrated a goal with a kiss on the lips. To
what Claudio's wife, model Mariana Nannis, said: "At times I
believe Diego is in love with my husband. It must be the long
hair and big muscles." |
