Oriundi - we need them now, and always have

When Antonio Conte was manager of the Italian national team, a controversy arose around the presence of Franco Vasquez and Eder in the national team. The former was born and raised in Argentina, and the latter in Brazil. One of the chief critics of this decision was current manager Roberto Mancini, who himself went on to call up Jorginho and Emerson Palmieri, both of whom were born and raised in Brazil. Italy’s success on the world stage has in large part been founded on naturalized citizens. The 1934 World Cup winning team had five South American born players, and 2006 had Mauro Camoranesi as a linchpin. In fact, the only World Cup winning Italian squad was in 1982, and even then, Claudio Gentile was born in Libya.

This post will focus on two players, Argentinian born Mauro Camoranesi, and Brazilian born Jorginho.

Mauro Camoranesi was born in Tandil, a town in the province of Buenos Aires. Camoranesi is somewhat of an enigma. He had excellent pace, vision and ball control. He had a powerful shot and was an excellent crosser of the ball, and yet he was never much of a goalscorer nor was he particularly creative. He could play on the wing or in central midfield, but no matter where he played you always got the feeling he was somehow out of fit. He was largely ignored by the Argentinian setup, and at age 27 he was called up for Italy by Giovanni Trapattoni. Despite this, at Juventus and for Italy, Camoranesi was very much an indispensable player. He was incredibly aggressive, and allowed the team to recover possession in the wings, and then laid it off the more creative Andrea Pirlo or Francesco Totti. After the victory against France, Camoranesi has Massimo Oddo cut off his iconic ponytail and displayed it front of the camera yelling ‘para los pibes del barrio’ (for the boys in the neighbourhood). Indeed the charismatic player never doubted his own “Argentinianness”.

Jorginho is an even more peculiar case. Born and raised in Imbituba, a small town in the Brazilian state of Santa Katarina. While Camoranesi waited for Argentina until 27, Jorginho waited for Italy. Arriving in Italy at the age of 15, Jorginho always maintained that his person was Brazilian, but the player was very much Italian. Players like Camoranesi are common in Argentinian football culture, but Players like Jorginho are relatively uncommon outside of Italy. He is a regista, he does not score unless from the penalty spot (he is a specialist), he does not collect more than 4 assists in a season and yet for every manager he is the base of the team. He is the metronome, he dictates the pace of the team and the direction and what he did at Napoli for four and a half seasons, what he is doing now at Chelsea, he will hopefully do this summer. The brilliance of a player like Jorginho is the effortless and almost unnoticeable way he quietly controls the game.

By Gianni Di Girolamo