One of the most revered defenders of his generation, Alessandro Costacurta’s storied career spanned three incredible decades. “Billy” first appeared for Milan in 1986, hanging up his boots 21 years later. As well as 59 caps for the Azzurri, Costacurta pulled on the famous Milan shirt 663 times.
His personal trophy haul is impressive: seven scudetti, a Coppa Italia, five Supercoppa Italianas, five European Cups, and four European Super Cups. Aside from a loan spell at Monza in the formative part of his career, he was a one-club man who was inducted into Milan’s Hall of Fame for his stellar service.
He also won two Intercontinental Cups. However, his relationship with the competition – created in 1960 to pit the champions of Europe and South America against each other to determine a de facto world king of club football – was like a rollercoaster.
Costacurta’s competitive debut for the Rossoneri came just months after Silvio Berlusconi took over the club, reviving the ailing giant which had only won one league title since the late ‘60s, even dipping into Serie B against a backdrop of scandal and financial problems. With the young, home-grown talent of Costacurta a bit-part player, Milan won the scudetto in 1988. That summer, manager Arrigo Sacchi found the final piece of his Dutch puzzle, adding Frank Rijkaard to the acquisitions of the previous year: Marco van Basten and Ruud Gullit.
In the ascendancy now, Milan won the European Cup in 1989. Costacurta formed part of a legendary all-Italian back four – alongside central defensive partner Franco Baresi and full-backs Paolo Maldini and Mauro Tassotti – that kept a clean sheet in a 4-0 demolition of Romanians Steaua Bucharest, in Barcelona’s Camp Nou.
Lifting the famous trophy-with-big-ears earned Sacchi’s men a trip to Tokyo to compete for the Intercontinental Cup against the Copa Libertadores champions. It was Milan’s third appearance in the competition. In 1963 the Italians were defeated by Pelé’s Santos; six years later Nereo Rocco’s men lifted the trophy but were made to suffer following two bruising encounters against Estudiantes. No longer a two-legged affair, from 1980 onwards the cup was contested as a one-off tie in the Japanese capital, with car giant Toyota the principal sponsor.
Milan’s opponents in December 1989, Atlético Nacional, whose side contained the goalkeeper of scorpion-kick fame, René Higuita, had beaten Paraguay’s Olimpia to lift South America’s top trophy. The success of the Verde Paisa, and the rise of Colombian football in general in the late 1980s, was fuelled by millions of dollars of drug money. Ruthless cartels warred with the state, and against each other. Few were safe. The culture of violence was never more evident than in 1994, in the wake of Colombia’s ignominious exit from the USA World Cup, when star defender Andrés Escobar – who scored an infamous own goal against the hosts during the tournament – was gunned down outside a Medellín nightclub. Escobar, then just 22, appeared for Atlético Nacional in Tokyo.
Dutch star Gullit – suffering with ligament damage in his right knee – was absent from Sacchi’s starting XI, and throughout the 90 minutes his compatriot Van Basten fought an exciting duel with Higuita. However, Francisco Maturana’s men kept Milan at bay and the 90 minutes of regulation time ended goalless.
With just one minute of extra time remaining, Van Basten was felled on the edge of the area. Alberico “Chicco” Evani, who had replaced Diego Fuser after 65 minutes, stepped up to take the set piece. His kick nicked off the thigh of the man on the right of the seven-man wall, taking it past Higuita and into the back of the net. The match finished 1-0 to Milan. Evani wasn’t a big name but was loved by Sacchi, a workhorse and unassuming player in a squad full of stars. He also scored the winner in the European Super Cup, proving he was a man for the big occasion despite his relatively modest status. His intervention in Tokyo earnt him the man-of-the-match award, a giant golden key, and a brand-new Toyota Carina from the sponsors.
Costacurta’s defensive unit kept a clean sheet, denying the dangerous Colombians for two hours. Franco Baresi lifted the classic golden Intercontinental Cup trophy; Mauro Tassotti did the honours with the Toyota Cup.
‘The game against Atlético Nacional was difficult,’ Sacchi told me when I interviewed the iconic coach for When Two Worlds Collide: The Intercontinental Cup Years. ‘I would say it was like reading a Kafka novel. They were a humble team but a proper team with a very good coach. They did very well to close all our spaces. Aside from their quality we also suffered the effects of jetlag. We arrived on a Monday and many of our players didn’t sleep until Thursday. They were very organised and talented. In fact, during my four years in that first spell at Milan, they were probably one of the best teams that we came across.’
It was a miraculous turnaround and run of success for Milan, given their troubles earlier in the decade. A day after Christmas, Van Basten was crowned as Ballon d’Or winner, with teammates Franco Baresi and Frank Rijkaard joining him on the podium, voted second and third respectively. The Dutch trio may have been the stars of the side, but Baresi, Costacurta and company provided them with a solid base on which to perform, the Rolls Royce engine underneath the slick, gleaming chassis.
Milan failed to win the Scudetto in 1989/90 but retained the European Cup, beating Benfica courtesy of a Rijkaard goal in Vienna. This gave the Rossoneri another crack at the Intercontinental Cup, and the chance to be the first side to retain the trophy since the Grande Inter team of a quarter century before. They would face Olimpia, the beaten finalists from 1989 who went one better, overcoming Ecuador’s Barcelona in the final.
On a rainy afternoon in Tokyo on 9 December, Sacchi was able to call upon all of his famed Dutch trio. Costacurta lined up as part of the same back four that faced Atlético Nacional, although Andrea Pazzagli replaced Galli in goal.
Milan eased to a 3-0 victory, with a Rijkaard double bookending Giovanni Stroppa’s goal. Rijkaard was voted man of the match but his countryman Gullit made a big difference. Learning from their mistakes the previous year, Milan were more prepared this time around, and didn’t suffer as much from jetlag which improved their on-pitch performance against the South American champions.
Costacurta and his fellow defenders kept another clean sheet and could be forgiven for thinking this Intercontinental Cup lark was a walk in the park. Ecstatic with his team’s performance, Sacchi told me: ‘We had a dream and we went beyond the dream.’
In 1991, Sacchi left Milan, taking over the Italian national team in the November of that year. His role was filled by Fabio Capello who led the Rossoneri to the final of the European Cup – now rebranded as the Champions League – in 1993. Milan lost to Marseille although the French club were later embroiled in a match-fixing scandal, stripped of their domestic crown and banned from international competition.
Marseille’s misfortune gave Milan a back door into the 1993 Intercontinental Cup, where they faced São Paulo. The Brazilians, led by Telê Santana, were reigning champions, having beaten Johan Cruyff’s Barcelona “Dream Team” in 1992 with Raí the standout star. Luckily for Milan, he’d joined Paris Saint-Germain but not before he’d helped the Tricolor Paulista retain the Copa Libertadores.
Regardless of their status as stand-ins, Capello’s side were powerful opponents and would’ve been fancied by many to win the Intercontinental Cup on 12 December – being played in the afternoon, local time, for the final time – in the Japanese capital. Sebastiano Rossi donned the gloves for Milan and Costacurta, along with Baresi and Maldini, retained his place in the defence. Christian Panucci was at right-back in place of Tassotti.
After 19 minutes of play in the Japanese midday sunshine, elegant midfielder Toninho Cerezo – the veteran who had spent almost a decade in Serie A with Roma and Sampdoria – picked up the ball in the centre of the field, stroking it to the right-wing with his left foot. His pass found the marauding Cafú – later of Milan – who crossed for Palhinha to score from eight yards. Costacurta’s last-ditch intervention wasn’t enough and for the first time in 239 minutes of Intercontinental Cup action, his defence had conceded. It set off an unfortunate chain reaction in the competition for the defender.
Daniele Massaro equalised for Milan after 48 minutes but 11 minutes later Cerezo restored his side’s advantage, coolly finishing a cross from the left with his right foot from close range. Having lost a header in the build-up to the goal, Costacurta was out of his position when the ball fell to the goal scorer. However, with 81 minutes on the clock, Jean-Pierre Papin finished off an excellent Milan move to make it 2-2.
With minutes to spare, Cerezo once again demonstrated his quality, finding space and lifting a perfectly weighted pass into Müller’s path. Rossi was quick off his line but misjudged his handling, allowing Müller to bundle home the winner. During his celebration, Müller – who spoke Italian due to three years with Torino – goaded Costacurta, pointing his fingers in his face and calling him a “clown” as the devastated defender placed his hands on his head. A few minutes earlier, the two had clashed, and this was Müller’s revenge. For Billy, it was an afternoon to forget.
In 1994 Milan won the Champions League, destroying favourites Barcelona 4-0 in Athens. Vélez Sarsfield, under Carlos Bianchi, won their first Copa Libertadores title after beating São Paulo on penalties. Madcap Paraguayan goalkeeper José Luis Chilavert was their hero in the shootout.
On 1 December, at 7.15pm, the two teams participated in the first night match of the Intercontinental Cup’s Japanese era, a time more palatable to audiences in Europe and South America. The first half was goalless but five minutes after the restart, Chilavert had the ball at his feet. Advancing out of his penalty box, he launched a long diagonal pass towards José Basualdo on the right-wing. The midfielder cut the ball back onto his left before centring, and as the deflected cross looped into the box, Costacurta was adjudged to have pulled down José Flores illegally. Despite protesting that his shirt was also being pulled, a penalty was awarded to Vélez. Roberto Trotta converted the penalty to give the Argentine side the lead.
Omar Asad, who would later pick up the man-of-the-match award, doubled Vélez’s lead after 57 minutes. The usually accomplished Costacurta was at fault again, selling Rossi short with a back pass. The Vélez forward pounced, showing a rapid change of pace to opportunistically intercept the tired and blind pass, round the goalkeeper and finish from a tight angle.
Costacurta’s miserable hat trick was completed after 85 minutes when José Torres Cadena showed him the red card. The 28-year-old gave the ball away too cheaply to Asad then hauled him down as the forward raced through on goal. The Milan website quite rightly describes Costacurta as “precise” and “disciplined” although on this night in Tokyo he was anything but.
The Intercontinental Cup defeat capped a frustrating year for the defender, who missed both the Champions League and World Cup finals through suspension and was now the protagonist in Milan’s defeat in the Japanese capital, the second year in a row his team had returned from the Land of the Rising Sun empty handed.
In 2003, Milan won the Champions League after beating Juventus on penalties after a drab affair at Old Trafford. Boca Juniors, at the tail end of an incredible spell under Carlos Bianchi, had just won their third Copa Libertadores title in four years.
In Yokohama, on 14 December, the two sides met in the penultimate version of the Intercontinental Cup before the long-running competition was discontinued, swallowed up by FIFA’s Club World Cup.
Boca had recent previous experience of the Intercontinental Cup, remarkably beating Real Madrid in 2000 before narrowly losing out to Bayern Munich – via a scruffy extra-time goal – the following year. Although the financial gulf was beginning to widen between European and South American football, Bianchi did a superb job to keep Boca competitive despite repeatedly losing their best stars.
Carlo Ancelotti was the man in Milan’s hot seat, and he had a star-studded squad at his disposal, including Cafú, Andrea Pirlo, Clarence Seedorf, and Kaká. Astonishingly, Milan could even call upon two players who had played in the same competition four times, going back to 1989: the vastly experienced duo of Maldini and Costacurta. Ancelotti had also played 14 years earlier against Atlético Nacional and here he was, managing two of his former teammates.
Milan took the lead after 23 minutes when Jon Dahl Tomasson latched on to a Pirlo pass before sliding the ball through the legs of Roberto Abbondanzieri. Five minutes later, Milan’s Dida made a save from compatriot Iarley after the Brazilian got his toe on the end of a Guillermo Barros Schelotto cross. However, the rebound fell to a grateful Donnet who was free to finish from close range to level the score.
There were no further goals in regulation or extra time, and the match went to penalties. After three kicks each, Boca led 2-1; Pirlo and Seedorf missed either side of Rui Costa’s successful conversion.
Costacurta stepped up. Abbondanzieri played mind tricks, standing out of the six-yard box and questioning the placing of the ball with the referee. The defender looked at the official, waiting for the go ahead, before glancing up at Boca’s goalkeeper. When striking, Costacurta seemed to take some of the turf with him, and the ball bobbled to a grateful Abbondanzieri. Head down, Billy looked ruefully at the floor, wondering why the surface had betrayed him. Ever the diplomat, Diego Maradona said: “Costacurta clearly shat himself.”
Raúl Cascini scored his penalty to become an unlikely hero and win the cup for Boca. Bianchi became the most successful coach in the history of the Intercontinental Cup, winning for the third time with two different clubs. Two of his three wins had come at the expense of Milan.
The longevity and success of Costacurta’s fabulous career marks him out as an all-time great. By the time Milan gained revenge over Boca to win the Club World Cup in 2007, Billy had only recently retired. His relationship with the Intercontinental Cup started so well, with two wins and two clean sheets under Sacchi in 1989 and 1990, but the last three versions – defeats in 1993, 1994, and 2003 – must leave a sour taste in the legend’s mouth and leave him with mixed feelings about the competition.