Cristian Volpato's phone smoked last Monday. Until an hour before midnight it did not stop ringing. From the antipodes Graham James Arnold was calling and sending messages to the Italian capital to try to convince the young midfielder to sign up with Australia to play the World Cup.
The coach's proposal was not at all strange, especially considering that it is a footballer of only 18 years born on the outskirts of Sydney who is just now beginning to show his head in the elite. It is true that he does it in a powerful championship like the Italian and in a historic team like Roma, something difficult to see in socceroos, unaccustomed to having stars in the big European leagues (Aaron Mooy, of Celtic Glasgow, is the great reference).
That is why Arnold was so insistent, even though he knew from the beginning that including Volpato among the 26 selected to travel to Qatar was almost a pipe dream. "Until 11:00 p.m. I was trying to convince him to join the team, I told him that he was among the 26 called up for the World Cup. He replied that he wanted to think and talk to people close to him to understand what was best for his career. He later decided to decline my offer."
The young attacker arrived in Italy at the age of 16 and his gestures (like his surname of Italian descent) do not give rise to speculation: his desire is to represent the Azzurra. This is demonstrated by the fact that this year he has played games in the lower categories of Italy, also scoring three goals (two of them in the U-19 European Championship, where the transalpine team reached the semi-finals).
The Australian footballer with the most future has given up playing with the socceroos because he considers that he will have more projection to grow as a footballer with Italy. Curiously enough, the reigning European Championship champions have failed to qualify for the last two World Cups, unlike Australia.
Volpato has justified the rejection of his country of origin and has not wanted to close the door, just in case. "There is a lot of speculation about the decisions that I have supposedly made at international level: the truth is that I am still at the beginning of my career and I am focused on continuing that process in Rome. Making any kind of hasty decision about my future at this early stage runs the risk of being extremely premature," the attacker wrote on social media one day before playing his first game as a starter against Sassuolo.
Born in Camperdown, Volpato came to prominence at an under-17 tournament in Malaysia and was spotted by scouts from the Giallorosso club. Since then he has not stopped growing. Sponsored by José Mourinho, the Setúbal coach made him debut with the first team last season and in the current one he is enjoying more and more opportunities, lately because of Paulo Dybala's injury.
Last week he made headlines for scoring the goal that turned the scoreboard against Hellas Verona and assisting in his team's third (1-3). "He is already a player with potential for the first team. He has a lot to learn, but I knew he could change the game," Mourinho said after that win against the Gialloblù team, precisely the same team with which Volpato debuted as a professional scorer on previous course.
Represented by the agency of Francesco Totti, the great legend of Roma, in the Olympic they dream of him becoming a great star. On the other side of the planet they have less esteem for him, especially because last March, when Japan sent Australia to the World Cup playoffs, Volpato shared an image of the match on television that showed the score (0-2) accompanied by an emoji crying of laughter. That mockery (for which he apologized) was not reason enough for the Aussie coach to throw in the towel.
