A regeneration of the Italian national football team

The term 'young players' is not really synonymous with Italian teams as is with the case of English and Spanish teams. This because Italian teams prefer to buy and have faith in tried and tested players rather than some unknown promising talent. The rationale behind this way of seeing things being that success can be 'acquired' quicker when buying experienced players rather than having patience in nurturing young talent. In time this has backfired on Italian teams for they now find themselves in a quandrum having to revolutionise their teams at a relatively high cost so as to become competitive as they once were, especially in Europe, whilst English and Spanish teams have the luxury of aiming to buy one or two quality players to complement their already existing competitive teams.

Yet Italy has always produced good quality young players and testimony to this are the 5 European Under-21 championships won since 1992.

Following is a list of potential young players that may have an important role to play with the Italian football national team in the coming years:

Goalkeepers: Amelia (Palermo), Consigli (Atalanta), Viviano (Brescia), Curci (on loan with Siena from Roma).

Defenders: Santacroce (Napoli), Santon (Inter), Criscito and Bocchetti (Genoa), Chiellini, De Ceglie and Ariaudo (Juventus), Motta (on loan with Roma from Udinese), De Silvestri (Lazio), Andreolli (on loan with Sassuolo from Inter), Bonera and Darmian (Milan).

Midfielders: De Rossi and Aquilani (Roma), Montolivo (Fiorentina), Marchisio (Juventus), Cigarini (co-owned between Atalanta and Parma), Dessena (co-owned between Sampdoria and Parma), Bolzoni (Inter), Pirlo (Milan).

Attackers: Giovinco (Juventus), Rossi (Villareal), Acquafresca (co-owned between Cagliari and Inter), Gilardino (Fiorentina), Balotelli (Inter), Paloschi (co-owned between Parma and Milan), Cerci (on loan with Atalanta from Roma), Lanzafame (on loan with Bari from Palermo), Paolucci (co-owned between Catania and Udinese), Osvaldo (Bologna), Pepe and Quagriaella (Udinese).

This is obviously not an exhaustive list and I am pretty positive that their are other promising Italian players that can be included in this list.

Many Italian teams have started to realize that the way forward without spending too much money is investing wisely in their youth academies. It is often the case that players that manage to make the grade from the youth team are usually a bit more passionate when playing than other players so this can be considered as an added bonus when investing and having patience with young players.

One hopes that in a year's time, there will be more than one Italian team in the combined final draw of the Champions League and the newly rebranded Uefa Europe League that will replace the current Uefa Cup as from July 2009.