Andre Pirlo Retires From Football

Physicality, pace, defensive diligence and a starched lifestyle of medicine balls and clean eating.

Andrea Pirlo had none of them.

By any objective assessment, he was profoundly unsuited to the helter-skelter world of a modern midfield - too slight to rule through muscle, too slow to escape the mob.

His rating in the latest edition of Fifa was a blunt barometer of his abilities.

Pace: 33. Defence: 46. Physical: 50. Shooting: 66.

To judge by his final two seasons at New York City FC, it was entirely accurate.

On Sunday evening, as the 38-year-old ambled off the bench as a 90th-minute replacement against Columbus Crew to play the 872nd and final game of his career, a sizeable section of the MLS side's support were ready to say goodbye.

Instead of the armchair he had been afforded when playing for AC Milan and Juventus, he was being asked to hustle around Yankee Stadium like a side-alley hawker.

It was a role he had never played, and never could.

His head was back in Europe, the fans said.

And that, with Pirlo, was key.

He was a player who defied the spreadsheets of 21st-century sports science.

Pirlo's magic was not in fast-twitch fibres or VO2 volumes.

It was in the top six inches. 'Cerebral' did not do it justice; his brain was a footballing supercomputer - as if Deep Blue had tired of chess and pulled on studs instead.

For every yard Pirlo lacked in pace, he made up two in anticipation.

Like a snooker player living three shots ahead, he had the uncanny ability to foresee how the kaleidoscope of 20 moving parts came together on the pitch.

Wherever pockets of space bubbled up, he would be in the centre of them, head up, breathing fresh air and taking in the view.

Then, ball at his feet, at the base of midfield, came the second half of his genius.

Slide-rule geometrics, feather-duster through balls, glorious cross-field parabolas or pinged top-corner heat-seekers - while others simply struck the ball, Pirlo's boot coaxed it into the perfect shape and weight with the dexterity of a potter's fingertips.

"He is one of the all-time greats without doubt," said Italian football expert James Horncastle on BBC's Euro Leagues podcast.

"He is one of the best free-kick takers we have ever seen play the game and a player who is synonymous with a position and a playing style. Very few players can say that."