World's back pages mourn Baresi, Milan's defensive art

The international press has led its coverage of Italian football this week with the funeral of Franco Baresi, the former AC Milan and Italy captain who died last week aged 66. The Guardian's picture gallery from the Basilica di Sant'Ambrogio in Milan shows former teammates and large crowds paying their respects to one of the finest defenders in the history of the game.

The funeral drew a scale of mourning that the foreign press reserved for figures who transcended their sport. The Guardian's coverage, headlined "Ciao capitano," captured the scene at the basilica, where the city's football community gathered to honour a player whose entire career was defined by a single club and a single city.

For the international sporting press, Baresi's death is not merely an Italian story. His reputation as a libero — the sweeper who redefined defensive play — made him a reference point for generations of football writers in London, Madrid and beyond, and his passing has been treated as a moment of world football significance.

Baresi spent his entire professional career at AC Milan, joining the club as a teenager and going on to captain the side through its most successful era under the ownership of Silvio Berlusconi. He was part of the Italy squad that reached the 1994 World Cup final, and his absence through suspension in that final against Brazil has remained a subject of enduring debate in the sport's historiography.

The Guardian's gallery emphasised the public nature of the mourning, with crowds lining the streets around Sant'Ambrogio and former teammates serving as pallbearers. The choice of the basilica, one of Milan's oldest churches, underscored the civic dimension of the farewell — a recognition that Baresi belonged as much to the city as to the club.

The foreign coverage also placed Baresi's career in the context of Serie A's global golden age. During his years at Milan, the club won multiple European Cups and domestic titles, and the international press has used his passing to revisit that era when Italian football was the benchmark for tactical sophistication across Europe.

For the world's sport pages, Baresi's death closes a chapter in the story of Italian football's international influence. His style of defending — reading the game rather than merely stopping attacks — was widely credited with shaping how the position was understood and taught, and tributes from foreign outlets have consistently returned to that legacy.

The funeral also drew attention to the relationship between Milan and its footballing icons. The Guardian's coverage noted the presence of former teammates, and the images conveyed a city in mourning for a figure whose name had become synonymous with the club's identity. The scale of the public response was itself a story the foreign press felt compelled to document.