Italian defender Giorgio Chiellini has claimed he imposed a ‘Kirikocho’ curse on England’s Bukayo Saka, who missed the final penalty in the Euro 2020 final shootout at Wembley Stadium on Sunday. Saka’s spot-kick was saved by goalkeeper Gianluigi Donnarumma to hand Italy the Euro 2020 title 3-2 on penalties after both teams drew 1-1 in 120 minutes. Just before Saka kicked off, Chiellini shouted “Kirikocho” – a word that football players have used for decades to inflict bad luck on the opposition.
Responding to a question from ESPN Argentina, Chiellini replied in Italian: “Hello Christian, I confirm everything! Kiricocho!”.
A video was uploaded by UEFA on its Twitter handle in which Chiellini was seen speaking as Saka started the run-up. The words have now been identified as ‘kirikocho’.
The origin of the curse is very interesting. According to some versions of the story, Juan Carlos ‘Kiricocho’, or Quiricocho, was a staunch supporter of the Argentine Club Estudiantes de la Plata in the 1980s.
The fan used to attend some of the club’s training sessions. One fine day, Estudiantes head coach Carlos Billardo began to notice that his players were strangely injured whenever Kirikocho was present.
Bilardo, as told in the legend, asks Kirikocho to attend a training session for Estudiantes’ opponents, hoping to use his strange powers to hurt the opposition.
Bilardo once said, “Kiricocho La Plata had a child who was always with us, and from the year we were champions (in 1982), we adopted him as our mascot.”
The legend of Kirikocho has since expanded, especially in the Spanish-speaking world. Players now utter the word whenever they want to curse an opposing player.
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