Gianluigi "Gigi" Buffon, Ufficiale OMRI

Order of Merit of the Italian Republic

The Order of Merit of the Italian Republic was founded as the senior order of knighthood by the second President of the Italian Republic, Luigi Einaudi in 1951...

(born 28 January 1978 in Carrara

Carrara

Carrara is a city and comune in the province of Massa-Carrara , notable for the white or blue-grey marble quarried there. It is on the Carrione River, some west-northwest of Florence....

, Italy

Italy

Italy , officially the Italian Republic languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Italy's official name is as follows:;;;;;;;;), is a unitary parliamentary republic in South-Central Europe. To the north it borders France, Switzerland, Austria and...

), is an Italian

Italian people

The Italian people are an ethnic group that share a common Italian culture, ancestry and speak the Italian language as a mother tongue. Within Italy, Italians are defined by citizenship, regardless of ancestry or country of residence , and are distinguished from people...

 footballer who plays as a goalkeeper for Serie A

Serie A

Serie A , now called Serie A TIM due to sponsorship by Telecom Italia, is a professional league competition for football clubs located at the top of the Italian football league system and has been operating for over eighty years since 1929. It had been organized by Lega Calcio until 2010, but a new...

 club Juventus

Juventus F.C.

Juventus Football Club S.p.A. , commonly referred to as Juventus and colloquially as Juve , are a professional Italian association football club based in Turin, Piedmont...

 and the Italian national team

Italy national football team

The Italy National Football Team , represents Italy in association football and is controlled by the Italian Football Federation , the governing body for football in Italy. Italy is the second most successful national team in the history of the World Cup having won four titles , just one fewer than...

. He has won the FIFA World Cup

FIFA World Cup

The FIFA World Cup, often simply the World Cup, is an international association football competition contested by the senior men's national teams of the members of Fédération Internationale de Football Association , the sport's global governing body...

 and is widely considered by fans and experts to be one of most dominant and successful goalkeepers in history. Buffon was declared by Pelé

Pelé

However, Pelé has always maintained that those are mistakes, that he was actually named Edson and that he was born on 23 October 1940.), best known by his nickname Pelé , is a retired Brazilian footballer. He is widely regarded as one of the greatest football players of all time...

 to be one of the 125 greatest living footballers in the world. He has been named the Serie A Goalkeeper of the Year

Serie A Goalkeeper of the Year

The Serie A Goalkeeper of the Year is a yearly award organized by the Italian Footballers' Association given to the Goalkeeper who has been considered to have performed the best over the previous Serie A season. The award is part of the "Oscar del Calcio" awards event.-Winners:-By club:-By...

 a record eight times and he has also been named the IFFHS (International Federation of Football History & Statistics) goalkeeper of the decade.
Buffon began his career with the youth system of Parma

Parma F.C.

Parma Football Club , commonly referred to as just Parma, is an Italian professional football club based in Parma, Emilia–Romagna that will compete in Serie A for the 2011–12 season, having finished in twelfth position last season. Founded as Verdi Foot Ball Club in July 1913, the club changed its...

 in 1991 at the age of 13.