Andrea Natali shined with Italy in their victorious U17 European Championship campaign and Bayer Leverkusen are ready to snap him up from Barcelona.
The Azzurrini shined at the tournament in Greece over the last few weeks, beating Poland, Slovakia, Sweden, England, Denmark and Portugal on their way to glory, winning the trophy for the first time in their history.
Natali featured often for Italy U17 at the European Championship, starting in five of their six matches. He was forced to miss out on the second game against Slovakia after picking up a red card in the opening match against Poland.
Bayer Leverkusen to snap up Italy talent
Fabrizio Romano highlighted how Bayer Leverkusen are ready to pick up Natali from Barcelona, where his contract expires at the end of this month. The Catalan outfit had been hoping to lock him down on a new deal, but are facing serious competition from the German champions.
Xabi Alonso’s side are ready to pay around €1m in compensation for the Italy U17 talent, who initially started out in the Milan youth system before heading off to Espanyol in January 2020.
How typical Of Italian clubs, they lack the courage to try young Italian players. Thankfully it took foreign coaches to launch the likes of Donnarumma. Clubs like Milan prefer French players , Udinese anyone except Italians. Why dont clubs like that leave serie A , they are damaging the Italian national team.
THis at a time when our under 17, 19 and under 20 teams have performed brilliantly. The spirit of 1943 lives on.