With a little distance, it was the right farewell for Giorgio Chiellini from the Squadra Azzurra on Wednesday.

Not with a win but with a defeat, a clear but honorable 0:3 against Lionel Messi's brilliant Argentina in the "Finalissima", the "final of finals" between the current European champions and the winners of the Copa America.

And that in the "football temple" at Wembley.

Where Chiellini, as captain of the Azzurri, had only experienced his greatest triumph eleven months earlier, beating England in the final of the European Championship, back then in the autumn of his career.

So now it's over.

At the age of 37, after 117 international matches, Chiellini will no longer wear the national jersey.

And not that of Juventus Turin, where he has been in service for the past 17 years.

Where he played 561 competitive games, won nine championship titles and five cup wins.

But where he also lost the final of the Champions League twice.

Just as he was denied success with the national team on the big international stage.

Italy disappointed at the 2010 World Cup in South Africa and 2014 in Brazil.

The four-time world champion failed to qualify for the 2018 final tournament in Russia in the play-off against Sweden.

It was the historic low point for the football nation and also for Chiellini.

Which was to be followed immediately by the next downpour, the missed qualification for Qatar 2022 again.

To understand Chiellini and his legacy – for the Squadra Azzurra and for Italian football in general – one must recall the images following the World Cup qualifying play-off defeat by North Macedonia on 24 March in Palermo.

The young players, including the middle-aged, fell to the ground in tears after the final whistle.

But Chiellini stood tall, comforted his heartbroken comrades, hugged them, comforted them, encouraged them with an encouraging smile: there would be a second, a third chance for them.

Certainly not for him.

It was his very last attempt at glory in azure that had just come to nothing.

Against a country that many Italians didn't even know where it was or even existed.

Chiellini, who hails from Pisa, started his career at AS Livorno and came to Turin via Fiorentina at the age of twenty, has been dubbed 'Re Giorgio'.

Nothing could be more wrong.

Chiellini was never a king.

He didn't rule.

Not about his rather limited technique as a footballer and not about the game or its structure.

Instead, he always served.

Always with physique and willingness to suffer.

Always self-sacrificing in defence, as a man mark of old hat and grain, as a bulwark in front of the goalkeeper and sometimes even behind him.

And not infrequently he smiled, half triumphantly and half apologetically, when he had once again stopped or cleared an opposing attacker in a tough effort.

Precisely because he knew how to lead a team, serving it and the common cause, "Cavaliere Giorgio" became a role model and fatherly friend for a whole generation of young and not so young Italian footballers - in Turin, in Serie A, in the Squadra Azzurra.

Now Ritter Georg is going to the USA, to Los Angeles FC.

In the New World, too, they will certainly understand what was once called chivalry in the Old World: humility in victory, generosity in defeat, loyalty and dignity always.

Addio, Cavaliere Giorgio.