Gabriel Batistuta

Topics: Argentina international footballers, Argentine footballers, Italian-Argentines

Gabriel Omar Batistuta , nicknamed Batigol, is a former professional footballer. The prolific Argentine striker played most of his club football at ACF Fiorentina in Italy, and he is the eighth top scorer of all time in the Italian Serie A league, with 184 goals in 318 matches between 1991 and 2003. On the international level, he is the all-time highest scorer for Argentina's national team, with 56 goals in 78 national team matches, and he represented his country at three FIFA World Cups. In 2004, he was named in the FIFA 100 list of the "125 Greatest Living Footballers".

When his club Fiorentina was relegated to Serie B in 1993, Batistuta stayed with the club and helped it return to the top-flight league a year later. A hero in Florence, the Fiorentina fans erected a life-size bronze statue of him in 1996, in recognition of his performances for Fiorentina. He never won the Italian league with Fiorentina, but when he moved to AS Roma in 2000, he finally won the Serie A championship to crown his career in Italy. He played his last season in Qatar with Al-Arabi before he retired in 2005.

Batistuta was born on 1 February, 1969, to slaughterhouse worker Omar Batistuta and school secretary Gloria Batistuta, in the town of Avellaneda, , but grew up in the near city of Reconquista. He has three younger sisters, named Elisa, Alejandra, and Gabriela.