Carlo Cudicini

Carlo Cudicini (born 6 September 1973) is a retired Italian footballer who played as a goalkeeper, most prominently for Chelsea.

He is the son of the former Milan goalkeeper Fabio Cudicini, and the grandson of Ponziana defender Guglielmo Cudicini.

Cudicini is currently a club ambassador and loan player technical coach at Chelsea.

Cudicini played 20 times for the Italy under-18 team between 1990 and 1992, and made a single appearance for the under-21 team, but never played for the senior team.

Cudicini started his professional career at Serie A side Milan in 1992, but struggled to break into the first team and was loaned to Como before moving to Prato and then Lazio in 1996.

Cudicini made only two appearances for Milan (1992–95) in the Champions League, one in the Coppa Italia and none in Serie A during that period in the club's history.

He featured on the bench in the 1993 Champions League final against Marseille.

He was loaned to Como for a season in 1993–94, and was subsequently transferred to Prato in 1995, and then to Lazio in 1996 where he suffered a serious wrist injury, and consequently only made one senior appearance.

He then moved to Castel di Sangro in 1997, where his injury problems persisted.

Having only made a single league appearance for Lazio, he moved a year later to Castel di Sangro and then to Premier League side Chelsea in 1999, initially on loan.

However, he was recommended to the Chelsea manager Gianluca Vialli by his friend, the Lazio goalkeeper Luca Marchegiani, and was sold to Chelsea for a fee of £300,000 in 1999.

After making his debut against Skonto Riga in a UEFA Champions League qualifier, Cudicini ended his first season at Chelsea with just three appearances in all competitions.

He was however on the bench as Chelsea won the 2000 FA Cup Final.

The following season, he started to appear more regularly and shared the starting spot with Ed de Goey (Cudicini started 23 league games, De Goey 15).

At Chelsea, he dislodged Ed de Goey from the number one spot and was voted Chelsea's Player of the Year for the 2001–02 season.

Despite a brief challenge from Mark Bosnich in the 2001–02 season, he retained his first team place with a string of excellent performances.

He was voted Chelsea's Player of the Year for the 2001–02 season by fans, reflecting the value he added to a team struggling for consistency.

In December 2001, he saved two penalties in a span of seven days from Sunderland's Kevin Phillips and Liverpool's Gary McAllister.

Cudicini was recognised as the best goalkeeper in the Premier League in the 2002–03 season, when he won the ITV Premiership Goalkeeper of the Season award.

Cudicini also saved a penalty from Arsenal's Thierry Henry to help earn his side a replay in the FA Cup.

In 2003, during his successful period at Chelsea, The Football Association attempted to select him for the England national team, but he was ineligible.

After a bright start to the 2003–04 season, the old injury problems experienced in his Lazio days came back, leaving him unable to carry on his success from last season and unable to play for a large portion of the season.

His value to the team was highlighted when Chelsea's replacement goalkeeper Marco Ambrosio failed to effectively fit into the first team, leading to Chelsea's exit from the Champions League at the semi-final stage to Monaco.

He further demonstrated his penalty saving prowess with a save from Manchester United's Ruud van Nistelrooy in a crucial Premier League tie.

However, he later made a mistake in the same game and allowing the same player to equalise, but Chelsea nonetheless secured a 1–1 draw that was enough for automatic UEFA Champions League qualification.

He remained first choice under Claudio Ranieri, but lost his starting spot to new signing Petr Čech in 2004 under new manager Jose Mourinho.

The 2004–05 season saw the arrival of new manager José Mourinho.

Cudicini saw competition after the arrival of Petr Čech.

Čech claimed that he would push Cudicini for a first team place and Cudicini was dropped to the substitute bench.

As a result, he missed out on a Premier League winners' medal as he managed only three league appearances all season, all of which came after Chelsea had secured the trophy.

He did, however, feature in most of Chelsea's FA Cup and League Cup games that season.

Chelsea reached the 2005 Football League Cup Final, however Cudicini was suspended as he had been sent off in an FA Cup tie the week before against Newcastle United.

This meant that Čech started and Lenny Pidgeley was on the bench.

Cudicini again was second choice to Čech, and managed only four league appearances as Chelsea won the Premier League for the second year in a row.

At the end of that season, Cudicini had saved 6 of the 12 penalties he had faced while between the posts for Chelsea, furthering his reputation as an excellent penalty stopper.

After Petr Čech was named in the FIFPro and Champions League 2005–06 team of the season, there was a great deal of speculation about Cudicini's future at Chelsea, leading to Cudicini release a statement confirming that he was comfortable at Chelsea, and hoped to help the team capture its first-ever Champions League title.

He silenced rumours that he was looking for a return to Italy when he signed an extension to his Chelsea contract in February 2006.

Cudicini left Chelsea in January 2009, having made 141 league appearances for the club, and joined local rivals Tottenham Hotspur.

At Tottenham, he remained second-or-third-choice throughout his spell, and only made 19 league appearances for the club.

In 2013, Cudicini signed for Los Angeles Galaxy of Major League Soccer, where he played the final season of his career.