A Critical Response to USA Today's Article: The Death of Davide Astori

This essay presents a critical response to a USA Today article covering the unfortunate death of Davide Astori, the captain of Fiorentina football club. Published on March 4, 2018, the article details the shocking news of Astori's sudden death at the age of 31, suspected to be due to cardiac arrest, which led to the postponement of top-division matches in Italy. The essay discusses the impact of Astori's death on football fans, fellow players, and the broader sports community, highlighting the reactions from various clubs, coaches, and players, including tributes and memorial gestures. It also raises questions about the adequacy of health monitoring for athletes and suggests potential areas for improvement in player welfare protocols. The analysis reflects on the emotional impact of Astori's death and the collective mourning within the football world, emphasizing the need for continued support and remembrance.

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Critical response
The purpose of this newspaper article is to focus on the unfortunate death of the captain
of the Fiorentina football club Davide Astori. This news had been published in the USA Today,
dated on 4th March, 2018 (Usatoday.com, 2018). This newspaper article is very much important
from the perspective of the football fans in particular. This article has been intended to the
football fans in particular. Many football fans of Fiorentina football club and Italian football fans
have been largely disheartened by this news. This newspaper article has been reported from
Udine, a town in Italy. Fiorentina went to this town to play their away football match for
Fiorentina against Udinese. This had been a very unnatural death for the Fiorentina captain who
was aged only 31 (Usatoday.com, 2018).
The reports have been very shocking as the captain of Fiorentina did not turn up at the
time of the breakfast since He has been a very efficient team member of the Fiorentina team in
his position. He has been a very successful defender for his club in all his appearances. The
reason of this unfortunate death has been suspected as normal cardiac arrest. As a repercussion,
all the matches in top two divisions in Italy had been postponed (Usatoday.com, 2018). Astori
had represented the national football team of Italy for 14 times as well. This match of Fiorentina
had been called off by the officials instantly. As it was thought to be an unnatural death for the
captain, his body had been taken to Santa Maria della Misericordia Hospital to investigate more
on this case. An autopsy had been done in order to have better results on this incident
(Usatoday.com, 2018).
The expert officials have expressed their views that the player had been monitored every
now and then about all the health issues that could trouble an athlete like him. The player did not

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answer to the calls of the Fiorentina staff in the morning. The officials of the Italian league were
also stunned by this fatal news. These athletes and sports professionals are always taken care of
in the best ways indeed. He has been a very valuable player for the club and had been playing for
Fiorentina since 2015 (Usatoday.com, 2018). The Club President had said that he was about to
be signed with a new deal for lifetime with the club. It has also been reported that Astori had
been suffering from a sudden illness for sometime but no prior diagnosis had found any serious
heart problems. This had really been a shocking thing for the club. The player had left his family
behind that consists of his wife, Francesca Floretti and their daughter who was only two years
old.
In the earlier times, there was a match to be begun between Cagilari and Genoa in Italian
Serie A. This match had to be stopped as well as the news of Astori’ss death came to the
forefront. Many of the players had played with Astori so naturally they had broken down in tears.
It can be argued why the club officials and doctors did not prepare an entire health report for all
the players of the club (Usatoday.com, 2018). The English football association or FA has already
declared that they will arrange a football friendly match at the Wembley stadium on 27th of
March in the memory of Davide Astori. The entire intended audience for the article i.e. the
football fans all over the world had been grif-stricken very badly. This is why most clubs and
national football federations decided to show respect to Astori in their own ways (Usatoday.com,
2018). The picture of Astori was being showed in the giant screens of the stadiums. This had
been very eventful from the all the angles as well.
It had also been reported that the Cagilari coach Diego Lopez had to be treated by doctors
as he had fallen ill after listening the news of death of Astori. The social media also went active
in this aspect when the Juventus captain Gianluigi Buffon had posted the picture of himself with

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Astori on Instagram after this incident (Usatoday.com, 2018). The current Chelsea coach and
former Italy coach Antonio Conte was wearing the black armband ahead of Chelsea’s Premier
League clash with Mancchester City at Etihad stadium in Manchester. In this article, a brief
history of Astori has been provided of how he became such a valuable player of Fiotentina after
great struggles. The coaches in Italy have expressed their opinion about Astori that he had really
been a true professional footballer and he has given his best all the times. These incidents of the
sudeen death will have to be controlled for the footballers in the future.

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References
Usatoday.com. (2018). Retrieved from
https://www.usatoday.com/story/sports/soccer/2018/03/04/fiorentina-captain-davide-
astori-dies-of-heart-attack-at-31/111080754/