Nicknamed “Roar of Thunder”, Riva is Italy’s all-time top
goalscorer and is famous in the Mediterranean nation for firing Cagliari to
their only league title in 1970.
“Italian football is in mourning because a genuine national
monument has left us today,” said Italian Football Federation president
Gabriele Gravina.
Riva had been in hospital in the Sardinian capital Cagliari,
where he stayed after the end of his playing career, reportedly after suffering
a heart attack over the weekend.
Riva scored 35 times in just 42 appearances for his country,
with whom he won the 1968 European Championship and reached the World Cup final
two years later.
Italy were swept aside in that final by Brazil, considered
one of the best teams in the history of football, but he scored a key goal in
the dramatic 4-3 defeat of West Germany in the last four.
He played almost his entire club career with Cagliari,
signing for them in 1963 and retiring in 1976 after scoring more than 200 times
for the island club.