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20. Stefano Sensi

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20. Stefano Sensi

I don’t like to generalize, but it’s a known fact that Italy produce the best food, the best wine, the best sports cars, and the best clothing. And sometimes, when you see a random player brush the ball like Botticelli taking a stroke on his canvas, or Michelangelo painting the Sistine Chapel, you just know he hails from the same country as Marco Verratti and Andrea Pirlo. In the purest sense of the word, Stefano Sensi is an artist. The 5′ 6″ controller grew up in Urbino, a municipality renowned for its legacy of Renaissance culture. Like everything in Italy, the buck stops at Giuseppe Marotta’s office, and when Sensi started to draw praise in January, he urged Juventus’ “partner club” Sassuolo to secure Sensi. Poised on the ball, astute in his defensive positioning, and mobile, Sensi can be the long-term answer to Daniele De Rossi for the national team. With his performances for the Neroverdi, Sensi has proven deserving of a call-up, indicating that he can be Verratti’s bunkmate for Italia’s double-pivot. Controllers are the rarest breeds in football, and Marco Verratti is one himself, but Sensi can avoid falling into the wannabe regista category by maintaining consistency and showing Italy why Juventus tried so hard to secure his signature. It may not be the tallest pivot, but a Sensi-Verratti midfield duo would bring back the days of calm and composed possession football under Marcello Lippi. Gian Piero Ventura should be turning up at the Città del Tricolore for Sensi’s performances, as that potential pivot would be a pleasing contrast to Antonio Conte’s workhorse interiors of Giaccherini and Parolo. It may not look like much, but as a certain Renaissance man said, “semplicità è l’ultima sofisticazione.”

Photo Credit: Valerio Pennicino

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