Rui Costa

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Rui Costa
Personal information
Full name Rui Manuel César Costa
Date of birth March 29, 1972 (age 34)
Place of birth Lisbon, Portugal
Height 1.80 m
Nickname Maestro
Position Attacking Midfielder
Club information
Current club SL Benfica
Number 10
Professional clubs*
Years Club Apps (goals)
1990-1991
1991-1994
1994-2001
2001-2006
2006-		 AD Fafe
SL Benfica
Fiorentina
AC Milan
SL Benfica		 38 (6)
107 (18)
239 (40)
169 (7)
0 (0)
National team**
1993-2004 Portugal 94 (26)

* Professional club appearances and goals
counted for the domestic league only and
correct as of 11:52, 5 April 2006 (UTC).
** National team caps and goals correct
as of 11:52, 5 April 2006 (UTC).

Rui Manuel César Costa, OIH, usually referred to simply as Rui Costa (pron. IPA: [ʁui 'kɔʃtɐ]) (born March 29, 1972 in Lisbon), is a Portuguese football player. He is an attacking midfielder for Portuguese club SL Benfica and is also capable of playing as a deep-seated defensive midfielder. Alongside fellow legend Luis Figo, he is considered to be one of the two best Portuguese playmakers of all time, and is known as the maestro. His pin-point passes, extraordinary vision on the pitch and ferocious right-footed kick made him famous all around Europe. In 2004, he was named by Pelé to the FIFA 100, a list of the 125 greatest living football players.

Contents

[edit] Career

At the age of 5, Rui joined the infant indoor soccer team of Damaia Ginásio Clube. Roughly four years later, at the age of 10, Rui tried his luck at SL Benfica. Within 10 minutes of training, Eusébio, who was supervising the youngsters, was impressed at Rui's skills. Up until 1990 Rui played for Benfica's youth squads. That season he was loaned to AD Fafe on a season long deal.

In 1991, after the Under-21 World Cup (which Portugal won after a victorious penalty kick scored by Rui Costa), Rui returned to Benfica. There, he conquered the Cup of Portugal (in 1993) and the Portuguese First Division Title (in 1993/94). This would be Benfica's last league title until eleven years later, in 2004/05. At the end of his third season at Benfica's senior squad, Fiorentina offered 6 million Euro for the young midfielder, an impressive fee at the time. Since the club was struggling with financial problems, Rui Costa had to leave.

Rui played for 7 seasons at Fiorentina, where he conquered two Italian Cups (in 1995/96 and 2000/2001). Despite the heavy competition (namely Zidane), Rui Costa was named the best number 10 player in the Serie A a few times. His departure of Fiorentina was discussed every season, since many clubs constantly showed interest in signing him. However, he only left when Fiorentina went bankrupt after the 2001/2002 season.

Fatih Terim was the coach of Fiorentina in the 2000-2001 season when he was leaving Fiorentina for AC Milan he took Rui Costa with him who payed the exorbitant amount of 35 million euros for the player. In signing Rui Costa became Milan's most expensive transfer of all-time. Rui played for five seasons in Milan, where he conquered one Serie A title, one Italian Cup, one Italian Super Cup, one UEFA Champions League and one European Super Cup.

Rui Costa was an irreplaceable figure for his first two seasons with Milan (In which Milan won the Champions League, European Super Cup, and Italian Cup), but went to be merely a substitute as Kaka went to make his entrance. This made Rui Costa unhappy, although he did admit that the emergence of Kaka brought sunshines for Milan.

In 2004, Rui played his last match for the Portuguese squad at the Euro 2004 final (where Portugual lost to Greece for 1-0).

On May 25, 2006, Rui Costa's return to SL Benfica to play for the forthcoming season was announced in a press conference. The player was released from AC Milan after both the player and the club reached an agreement to end the contract that binded them one year before its term. Rui Costa also gave up his 4.6 million euro contract/year to play in the club that, year after year, dreamed about the player's return.[1] Rui's affection for Benfica is publicly known and so is his desire to end his career at the Portuguese giants. He may play one last final hurrah with Portugal for the Euro 2008 play, but rumors are unlikely.

[edit] Golden Generation

Costa is a member of the popularly coined "golden generation" in Portuguese football, and alongside Luis Figo symbolises the reasons why that term came into use. The Portuguese under-20 national team won two successive World Youth Championships in 1989 and 1991; Costa and fellow FIFA 100 member Luís Figo were stars on the 1991 team. With their spectacular success at youth level, much was expected of the Portuguese national team at senior level as their galaxy of stars matured. However, they did not win a major international tournament at senior level, although they reached the semi-finals at Euro 2000, qualified for the 2002 World Cup and the last several members helped lead Portugal to its first-ever major final at Euro 2004, losing to Greece. However the Portuguese national team looks very strong to win an international championship soon.

[edit] Trivia

  • In a friendly match between Benfica and Fiorentina played at the old Estádio da Luz (with Rui on the Italian side), Rui Costa scored one goal but he did not celebrate: he cried, because he scored against the team he loves.
  • He is very superstitious about wearing the number 10 shirt - recently, at Benfica, Giorgos Karagounis offered him the 10 jersey.
  • Although he played 12 years in Italy, he admits that he doesn't like pizza.
  • He scored the penalty that gave Portugal the Under-20 World Cup of 1991, in Lisbon, against Brazil.

[edit] Honors

[edit] External links

Portugal Portugal squad - 2002 FIFA World Cup Portugal

1 Baía | 2 J. Costa | 3 Xavier | 4 Caneira | 5 Couto | 6 Sousa | 7 Figo | 8 Pinto | 9 Pauleta | 10 Rui Costa | 11 Conceição | 12 Viana | 13 Andrade | 14 Barbosa | 15 Nélson | 16 Ricardo | 17 Bento | 18 Frechaut | 19 Capucho | 20 Petit | 21 Nuno Gomes | 22 Beto | 23 Rui Jorge | Coach: Oliveira
SL Benfica - Current Squad

1 Moreira | 2 P. Correia | 3 Anderson | 4 Luisão | 5 Leo | 6 Petit | 7 M. Ferreira | 8 Katsouranis | 9 Mantorras | 10 R. Costa | 11 Miguelito | 12 Quim | 13 Alcides | 14 Diego | 15 P. Jorge | 16 Beto | 17 Kikin | 18 Manu | 19 Karyaka | 20 Simão | 21 N. Gomes | 22 Nelson | 24 B. Costa | 25 N. Assis | 26 Karagounis | 28 J. Coimbra | 30 Miccoli | 31 Moretto | 33 R. Rocha | Manager: F. Santos



Persondata
NAME Costa, Rui Manuel César
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Costa, Rui
SHORT DESCRIPTION Professional football player
DATE OF BIRTH March 29, 1972
PLACE OF BIRTH Lisbon, Portugal
DATE OF DEATH
PLACE OF DEATH
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