Nicolo Fagioli could lead a midfield revolution at Juventus

Nicolo Fagioli and his bright pink Nikes took centre stage late on as Juventus eased to a 3-0 triumph over Crotone last February.

It was the young midfielder’s Serie A debut and one that garnered plenty of admiration despite the transience of Fagioli’s cameo performance. Expectations and excitement had to be tempered, however. This was Juventus we were talking about. A club that boasts a woeful track record of producing and developing their own at a senior level in the modern-day.

Throughout the Bianconeri’s decade-long reign of calcio in the 2010s, emphasis was placed upon signing and integrating the finished product as opposed to nursing home-grown stars. Alas, Ciro Immobile, Leandro Spinazzola and Riccardo Orsolini were forced to forge careers outside of Turin, while Aaron Ramsey, Dani Alves and Adrien Rabiot were signed as free agents on mammoth wages.

But amid a rebuilding process, Juventus have been blessed with their most talented core of youngsters in a generation. This season, we’ve seen Koni De Winter, Matias Soulé and Fabio Miretti earn minutes for Massimiliano Allegri’s senior side, while others have starred out on loan.

None more so than the aforementioned Fagioli.

Massimiliano Allegri is a huge admirer of midfielder Nicolo Fagioli

It was Andrea Pirlo who gave Fagioli his first taste of senior football, but the young Italian midfielder was limited to just two appearances. Thus, Juve proactively opted to send the 20-year-old out on loan to Serie B outfit Cremonese where he’s been nothing short of a revelation.

Fagioli has eight goal contributions in 17 league appearances for the Serie A hopefuls, including one goal and three assists in his last three outings. As a result, the precocious midfielder earned his maiden call up to the Italian national team at the end of January with Roberto Mancini organising a ‘get-together’ training camp ahead of March’s all-important World Cup play-offs.

For some, Fagioli’s rise has been a matter of inevitability and perhaps his most significant admirer is the current Juventus boss. Before Massimiliano Allegri departed the club in 2019, he said of the midfielder: “We have Nicolò Fagioli, a guy born in 2001 who knows football and its tempo very well, it’s a pleasure to see him playing.”

La Gazzetta dello Sport’s Giovanni Albanese recently commented on Allegri’s long-time appreciation of the player, writing that Juventus and Allegri believe Fagioli could become one of the best players in Italian football and are keen to implement him into the senior set-up next season.

Such news is incredibly exciting for Juventus fans, who are seeing their midfield revolutionise before their eyes. After the superb Manuel Locatelli was brought in the steer the ship in the summer, the club replaced Rodrigo Bentancur with Denis Zakaria in January and they could potentially flood their midfield depth chart with gifted youngsters at the start of 2022/23.

While Weston McKennie is a player worth keeping, both Arthur Melo and Adrien Rabiot may well be dispensible come the summer. The pair, who are yet to convince in Turin, could be usurped by Fagioli and Nicolo Rovella with Fabio Miretti lurking in the background.

Ever since Andrea Pirlo hung his boots up and Paul Pogba dabbed his way back to Old Trafford, the middle of the park has been a distinct problem area for Bianconeri. Functionality proved enough during the latter period of Allegri’s first reign, but this evolved into incompetence during the Maurizio Sarri and Pirlo eras.

The midfield star of Sarri’s reign, Bentancur, then emerged as public enemy number one following Pirlo’s appointment. This vicissitude in fortune rather epitomised the instability that surrounded the position during this period.

Alas, a midfield balance was almost impossible to strike, and while Juve went a long way to mitigating their woes in the middle of the park by signing the brilliant Locatelli, the club are still a dimension or two away from replicating their Pogba, Pirlo, Marchisio, and Vidal peak.

But in Fagioli & Co, Juventus may well have a shot of revolutionising their midfield from within.