Mario Frustalupi (12 September 1942 – 14 April 1990) was an Italian footballer, who played as a midfielder.

Playing career

Born in

Orvieto Orvieto () is a city and ''comune'' in the Province of Terni, southwestern Umbria, Italy, situated on the flat summit of a large butte of volcanic tuff. The city rises dramatically above the almost-vertical faces of tuff cliffs that are compl ...

( Umbria), Frustalupi debuted in Italian Serie A in 1963 with Sampdoria, for which he played in 8 seasons. In 1970, he moved to FC Internazionale, then in need of a replace for Luis Suárez, but Frustalupi disappointed the premises. With the Milanese team he won a ''scudetto'' and reached the final of the

European Cup The UEFA Champions League (abbreviated as UCL, or sometimes, UEFA CL) is an annual club football competition organised by the Union of European Football Associations (UEFA) and contested by top-division European clubs, deciding the competit ...

1972 Within the context of Coordinated Universal Time (UTC) it was the longest year ever, as two leap seconds were added during this 366-day year, an event which has not since been repeated. (If its start and end are defined using Solar time, me ...

, losing against Ajax. The following year he was sold to

S.S. Lazio Società Sportiva Lazio (; ; ''Lazio Sport Club''), commonly referred to as Lazio, is an Italian professional sports club based in Rome, most known for its football activity. The society, founded in 1900, plays in the Serie A and have spent ...

. Although he often quarrelled with the club's leading star striker Giorgio Chinaglia, he contributed to make the team one of the strongest in Italy, as shown by the side's ''scudetto'' victory in

1974 Major events in 1974 include the aftermath of the 1973 oil crisis and the resignation of United States President Richard Nixon following the Watergate scandal. In the Middle East, the aftermath of the 1973 Yom Kippur War determined politics; f ...

. He also had a successful stint with A.C. Cesena, which under him reached its best result ever in the league, a sixth-place finish in Serie A and the right to play in the UEFA Cup. In 1977 Frustalupi went to Pistoiese, being a protagonist of the first team's promotion to Serie A. He retired in 1981.

Death

Frustalupi died on the highway near San Salvatore Monferrato in a car accident in 1990, while he was going to Cervinia to join the family in holidays.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Frustalupi, Mario 1942 births 1990 deaths People from Orvieto Italian footballers Serie A players Serie B players Inter Milan players A.C. Cesena players Empoli F.C. players S.S. Lazio players U.C. Sampdoria players Road incident deaths in Italy U.S. Pistoiese 1921 players Sportspeople from the Province of Terni Association football midfielders Footballers from Umbria