The World Cup winner does not say much but when he does open his mouth, it's always worth listening to - while some of the game's greats have been awestruck by the midfielder.
Marcello Lippi once described Andrea Pirlo as "a silent leader who speaks with his feet". In that sense, Pirlo is a poet of the football field, a master of style and rhythm. He can do whatever he wants with the ball, but he runs the game because he understands the game. He is one of the football's great thinkers.
He knows it, too, as evidenced by the fact that he called his autobiography, 'I think, therefore, I play.