Alessandro Pistone

Football player infobox
playername = Alessandro Pistone


fullname = Alessandro Pistone
dateofbirth = birth date and age|1975|7|27
cityofbirth = Milan
countryofbirth = Italy
currentclub = R.A.E.C. Mons
clubnumber =
position = Full-back
youthyears =
youthclubs =
years = 1993–1994
1994–1995
1995–1996
1996–1997
1997–2000
1999
2000–2007
2007–
clubs = Solbiatese
Crevalcore
Vicenza
Internazionale
Newcastle United
→ Venezia (loan)
Everton
R.A.E.C. Mons
caps(goals) = 020 (1)
029 (4)
006 (0)
045 (1)
046 (1)
010 (0)
103 (1)
004 (0)
nationalyears = 1995–1997
nationalteam = Italy U21
nationalcaps(goals) = 011 (2)
pcupdate = 13 April 2008 (UTC)
ntupdate = 13 April 2008 (UTC)

Alessandro Pistone (born July 27, 1975 in Milan) is an Italian footballer, currently playing for R.A.E.C. Mons.

Club career

Early career

Pistone started his career at Solbiatese and Crevalcore, two small Italian teams who in recent years have slid to the lowest tier of professional Italian football, before moving to Vicenza for the duration of the 1995-96 season. He transferred to Internazionale for season 1996-97.

Newcastle United

After an impressive season at Internazionale, Newcastle United manager Kenny Dalglish snapped Pistone up for 4.3 million pounds in July 1997. He played in the losing FA Cup final against Arsenal. After Dalglish was sacked, Pistone was frozen out of the team by his replacement Ruud Gullit and banished to the reserve team along with former club captain Rob Lee as well as being sent out on loan to Venezia. After Gullit was sacked, Pistone was restored to the first team by Bobby Robson, [cite news
date=1999-11-21
url=http://www.nufc.com/html/times_pistone.html
title=Alessandro Pistone - Interview
publisher=The Times
accessdate=2008-06-02] before being sold to Everton in 2000.

Everton

Pistone appeared in the first match of the 2000-01 season, before being beset by a year full of injuries, including a six-month layoff for a knee injury. Throughout the following season he also suffered a major injury, thus missing most of the campaign. During the next season, however, he notched his first goal for the club against Bolton Wanderers.

Though initially his future looked bleak after David Moyes would only offer Pistone a one year contract which Pistone refused to sign but he later offered a two year contract due to a left-back crisis and having played in the vast majority of games through 2004-05, he returned to the first-team lineup for the 2005-06 season. However he soon received a cruciate knee ligament injury which ended his season prematurely.

Pistone was released by Everton at the end of the 2006-07 season on 14 May 2007. [cite news |url=http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/football/teams/e/everton/6655123.stm |title=Everton release Pistone & Wright |publisher=BBC Sport |date=2007-05-14 |accessdate=2007-05-14]

Later career

On August 31, it was confirmed by Middlesbrough manager Gareth Southgate that Pistone was having trial at the Premier League club and, as Pistone was a free agent, he could be signed after the transfer deadline, giving Southgate more time to decide. It was reported on September 9, that Southgate had decided against offering Pistone a contract. Pistone also went on trial with Watford but could not convince Aidy Boothroyd to offer him a contract. [http://www.watford.vitalfootball.co.uk/article.asp?a=83675] . He signed for Belgian club R.A.E.C. Mons on December 6, 2007, after a successful trial.

International career

With the Italian Under-21 national team he won in 1996 the European Under-21 Championship. He also played for Italy at the 1996 Olympics.

Notes

External links

*soccerbase|id=10703|name=Alessandro Pistone
* [http://www.figc.it/nazionali/DettaglioConvocato?codiceConvocato=1570 FIGC] it icon