I hope he returns.  I dont care how old or tired or not match fit he is. he is better than kala, bonera, simic, combined.

Old? He's the heart and soul of this team! Milan reach an even higher (heavenly) level when he's on the field... some may not realize it but he's a huge loss for the team and we do really miss him! We've played all our games this season without out true captain, that is HUGE!

I know how you feel i feel the same.  I feel naked when kala or bonera plays in the back

I don't feel naked... but I slowly tear my clothes off when Kaladze is playing so I end up like that...

So...when Kaladze plays, you do a strip tease? Kinky.

uh-oh ...take it easy now ladies....dst close ur mouth and wipe off the drool...you're never gonna look that cool.

I hope he gets back to full fitness sooner than later, even at his age he is one of the best defenders in the World in my opinion.

I hope he gets back to full fitness sooner than later, even at his age he is the best defender in the World in my opinion.

Correction:
Your welcome

Maldini is one of three active Milan players who have earned the most caps for their national teams; the others are Cafu and Dario Å imić.

[At the end of the season, you and Maldini will end your careers. What will football lose?

"Maldini is number 1, the point of reference for all footballers for his career, for his victories, for how he behaves both on and off the pitch." ]

There were rumors this morning in Corriere dello Sport that he was going to announce his retirement after the CWC. He's come out with an immediate denial in a Studio Sport interview.

ok I know that you guys won't find this pic as great as I did but I had to post it 'cause, well it's God what other reason would I need?

Liedholm was on the bench when he let the precocious young defender on to the field on January 20, 1985 against Udinese.


In a bizarre twist of fate, Maldini marks the 23rd anniversary of that day by facing the Friulani again this Sunday, January 20, 2008.

Sometimes during my lunch break, I'll take a look at the 606 message boards on bbc.com. It's sometimes interesting to see what people are talking about there.

I came across THIS article today. Given how critical people frequently are of Italian football and Italian players, this piece came as a very nice surprise.

Sometimes during my lunch break, I'll take a look at the 606 message boards on bbc.com. It's sometimes interesting to see what people are talking about there.

I came across THIS article today. Given how critical people frequently are of Italian football and Italian players, this piece came as a very nice surprise.

* Best known social past time: A meal in a good restaurant with family or friends, and then an early bed.
* The Giorgio Armani story: When the fashion designer attended one of the Italian team's training sessions prior to its departure for USA 94, he was asked if he would have liked to use any of the Italian squad as models for his clothes range. His unhesitating reply was inevitable --- "Maldini".
Excerpts from "Maldini, too good to be true" by Paddy Agnew:
* Milan and Italy left-back Paolo Maldini is almost too good to be true. Successful, glamorous, good looking and with estimated annual earnings in excess of 1.5 million pounds, he is not only one of Italian soccer's undisputed world class talents but also highly respected and liked within the Italian soccer community.
* The problem with Paolo... is that he's faultless. Maldini is a model pro. He is a model, yes, in his professional and serious attitude, in the fact that he is not a player to cause problems for team mates, his coach, his club, or indeed for himself. He is, however, much more than just a model professional. He is God's greatest gift to the pressurised team coach.
* Nonetheless, the point had been made. Class is no water, as Italians say, and Paolo Maldini has lots of it.

In the rather fetid pit that is Italian football, Maldini has been a shining light for years now - one of football's great ambassadors and one who will be deeply missed in the game.

Absolute legend - saw him play twice at the San Siro, against Roma for the title and against Barca in the Champions League. Even in his late 30's, and with no pace left, he was there marshalling the defence, and if you looked carefully he did not run after the ball but ran to where he knew the striker wanted to take it! Experience, poise, grace and talent in the most magnificent defender of my lifetime.

A true embodiment of the word LEGEND, and a true testament to what the term 'world class' means. Many salivate over performances of Premier League players today and label them the legends and world class, Maldini has played the best and beat them, from Maradona to Ronaldo. A true role model for not just budding footballers, but human beings as well.

For a modest chap who prefers mum's pasta to Carluccio's finest, Paolo Maldini made quite a splash when he stepped into Serie A 23 years ago. He, more than Gunnar Nordahl, Gianni Rivera or Ruud Gullit, became the symbol of AC Milan. Not bad for a full-back, but then Italy reinvented the breed.

So what kind of man is this who can dispossess Diego Maradona and force Zinedine Zidane to seek refuge on the other side of the park? Maldini shrugs his shoulders as if to say: "Just doing my job." His acceptance speech after winning World Soccer magazine's player of the year award in 1996 went something like: "What, me? I'm a defender."

Most women would risk their long-term relationships for half an hour with him. He's impossibly good-looking, even by Italian standards; he's captain of the world club champions; a euro-billionaire and a male model. If pushed, he'll host your disco.

All right, where's the catch? Cocaine problem? Serial philanderer? Well, no, actually. Paolo Maldini is like one of those infuriating swots who wins all the school prizes and stars in the nativity play. Blemish-free. By his mid-teens he was DJ at a local radio station, where he fell in love with a stunning young model of Italo-Venezuelan origin called Adriana Fossa, later to become his wife. Italian footballers don't do ugly.

Giorgio Armani desperately wanted Maldini to model his clothes when he kitted out the Azzurri for the 1998 World Cup. The player declined. With a more acquisitive temperament and a pushy partner he'd have out-Beckhamed David Beckham by now. Can't you just see him as the new Marcello Mastroianni in a remake of La Dolce Vita?

As it is, Maldini is content to be a legend in his own dressing room. Even that can be embarrassing. He was surprised that an English journalist would think him important enough to write home about. Surely his forthcoming retirement didn't deserve the Sinatra treatment? On Saturday he played his 1,000th game for club and country when he came on as substitute in Milan's 0-0 draw at Parma, yet when I reminded him that he was the longest-serving one-club man in history, he had no idea. Maybe he is as institutionalised in his way as Rudolf Hess was in Spandau Prison. Or maybe AC Milan really is the greatest place on God's earth.

"Fantastic facilities," says Ray Wilkins, a team-mate of Maldini in the mid-Eighties. "When you consider that Milanello, the training camp, was probably built half a century before Arsenal's and Manchester United's you realise how advanced they are. The players' restaurant is the best in Milan."

If it hadn't been for the flashing smile, eyes the colour of Colombian coffee beans and that trademark central parting, the world's most decorated footballer would have been indistinguishable from the tifosi waiting for a glimpse of him at Milanello. The crumpled jeans, lived-in leather bolero and workaday trainers were regulation issue. At least they were designed to look like that. Apart from his collection of 100 pairs of jeans, most things about Paolo Maldini are understated: his outfit; his public persona; his football and his lifestyle.

He says: "There's nothing unusual about serving the same employer for 23 years." That might have been true in a Scunthorpe iron foundry but not turn-of-the-millennium football, where transfer bonuses buy you that villa in Dubai and loyalty is an indication that you were breast-fed too long.

In any case, he has been at Milan for 29 years if you include his apprenticeship. I asked Maldini whether he had been tempted in all that time to join Manchester United, Real Madrid or another big European club. "Not once," he replied unhesitatingly. "I have great respect for the Premier League, but why leave Milan? I've got everything I want here. Il Milan e la mia famiglia." We haven't heard an Englishman utter those sentiments since Pongo Waring was banging in goals for Aston Villa between the wars.

Maldini resisted my invitation to speak English, claiming he hadn't progressed beyond his aunt's pen turning up on his uncle's desk. I knew that was a porky because of a television interview I did with him during Euro '96. But I hadn't come to Milanello to argue, so Italian it was. I heard about his voluntary 30 per cent pay cut when the Milan president Silvio Berlusconi was feeling the pinch, and how he agreed to halve his salary from €5?million to €2.5?million for this, his final season, knowing that his troublesome knees would reduce his availability. "Despite the occasional pain," he said, "I still get pleasure from training and playing. Just as important, I still enjoy the camaraderie in the dressing room." Then he gazed out of the window at the manicured lawns of Milanello, edged with distant, snowcapped mountains and sighed: "I shall miss this place."

Why did he stay on after winning the World Club Cup against Boca Juniors last December? Wasn't that a more natural "out" than his 40th birthday in June? He replied: "They asked me to." Milan have a habit of looking after their ageing gems.

His father, Cesare, who captained Milan to their first European Cup title in 1963 and coached his son in the Italian national side from 1996 to 1998, told me that Sir Alex Ferguson spoke to Paolo when he was already in his thirties about the possibility of a lucrative swansong at Old Trafford. Paolo barely flinched.

Said Cesare: "He grew up at AC Milan. You can't change your birth sign." With five Champions League medals and goodness knows how many scudettos in his cabinet, who cares about being institutionalised? Curiously, in 126 appearances for Italy, he never won a title. Brazil beat them on penalties in that mind-numbing 1994 World Cup final and France squeaked past them in the European Championship final six years later.

He says: "They were my biggest disappointments. It's funny that as soon as I retired from international football, Italy won the World Cup."

It's a tribute, not to say a bloody miracle, that he's navigated paparazzi-infested waters and endured almost daily intrusions into his life without the merest hint of scandal. Not even a boozy night out. What's his problem?

"My father instilled in me the need to behave correctly on and off the pitch. I don't remember him as a player but he coached me as a boy and taught me how to be a man." He was evidently a good student. According to Wilkins: "Not only is Paolo a lovely fella, he also had the intelligence and humility to handle any situation. They're vital qualities for a superstar."

Just when we thought it was safe, there's a third Maldini in the Milan academy. And wouldn't you know, Paolo's 11-year-old son, Christian, is a full-back, too. I wondered about a possible repeat of last month's episode at Inter, where Robert Mancini gave his 17-year-old son, Filippo, a first-team debut in the Coppa Italia?

Paolo smiled: "That won't happen with Christian because I have no intention of becoming a coach. If he makes it, I'll be there to support him as a proud father." He continued: "I would like to stay with the club in some capacity but that's still to be decided."

The dynasty, you suspect, will go on and on. It could have been so different. Paolo was a Juventus fan at school.

The dynasty, you suspect, will go on and on. It could have been so different. Paolo was a Juventus fan at school.

We haven't heard an Englishman utter those sentiments since Pongo Waring was banging in goals for Aston Villa between the wars.