‘Juventus Primavera & Youth Sector’ Latest: Presenting Schiavone & Padovan – Setting Primavera’s Pace

Without any games until this week-end and training only just resuming, the lack of young Bianconeri news was taken as an opportunity by our resident expert Adam Digby. Busy as ever, he profiles two more players to have played key roles in the Primavera side this season: Andrea Schiavone and Stefano Padovan. Read on to find out if the kids are future champion material.

The Campionato (at every age level throughout the Settore Giovanile) remains on its Winter Break, allowing us to continue where we left off last week and fill in some details on the youngsters making an impression at the Primavera level. The squad will need to be firing on all cylinders when games resume, given that Juve’s post-break fixtures include two back-to-back encounters with the only side to beat them this term, Fiorentina.

The league and Coppa double-header vs. La Viola shapes up to be a defining one in their season, and with the 2012 Viareggio Cup looming large, Marco Baroni will require nothing less than the best from his team. These two Turin natives represent just that.

Andrea Schiavone

Tipped for stardom from a very early age, Schiavone has always found himself playing at a higher level than his years should allow. He broke into the Allievi Nazionali (U-17) when still only 13 and made his Primavera debut in early 2010 at just 17 years of age. Whilst this may not be considered prolific progress in other countries (or indeed other Italian teams, even), remembering he has done so during the Juve Youth Sector’s perhaps worst-ever period makes the achievement even more remarkable.

Indeed, with the young players and their teams almost entirely neglected during the Alessio Secco era, it is highly impressive the Turin-born midfielder has still managed to make such an impact. As his fledgling career has progressed, Schiavone has adapted his game accordingly, from being compared to Andrea Pirlo by Massimo Maddaloni – his then coach in the Giovanissimi Regionali (U-15) – as far back as 2008 to the Allievi coach eighteen months later, Domenico Maggiora, likening him to Daniele De Rossi. The manager said of him last season:

I am convinced that Schiavone will play well with the Primavera, he will have no problem with the increased physicality. He is an excellent player with great feet, is strong in the air and the tackle, while also having a great shot, especially with his right foot. He really is one of the jewels of Juve.

Having always enjoyed successful debuts (he registered two assists on his bow for the Primavera, under Giovanni Bucaro’s predecessor Luciano Bruni), Schiavone’s technical skill is clearly evident as he looks to emulate players like Claudio Marchisio and Raffaele Palladino while he makes the leap into the first team. He may find his path there blocked however, with Gabriel Appelt and Luca Marrone (within the club’s ranks) and the out-on-loan Manuel Giandonato (currently with Lecce) already set to fill in for the magnificent M-V-P trio of Marchisio, Arturo Vidal, and Pirlo.

Schiavone is doing his best to jump the queue though, taking over as captain in the absence of injured Alberto Libertazzi and leading the incredible unbeaten run enjoyed by Baroni’s team. He has formed a superb midfield partnership with Yussif Chibsah, anchoring the 4-2-3-1 formation alongside the Ghanaian to great effect. Schiavone – who turns 19 in February – has played twelve of the team’s thirteen league fixtures to date, as well as three of their four Coppa ties.

One of the only players not to suffer from the seemingly endless rotation employed by Baroni, the youngster has already featured in as many games this term as he did in the whole of the previous campaign. He has kept his place not only through industriously providing a strong filter for the defence, but also key goals and thus valuable points to his team. He enjoyed none of his three league strikes with more delight though, than his coolly-taken penalty in the Coppa Italia Quarter-Final tie against Napoli.

Stefano Padovan

If goals have been a bonus from Schiavone, then for the 17 year-old Stefano Padovan they have become almost automatic. Already standing 1.86 meters, the Turin-born striker not has not only already developed the physical characteristics of a typical prima punta, he has the lethal finishing touch of one too. Notching 4 goals in his last two appearances to enter the Winter Break with an overall record of 7 in nine games, his strike rate becomes even more remarkable when taking playing time into account, equating as it does to a goal every 82 minutes.

Studying to become a surveyor as well as playing, Padovan has been simply unstoppable since the injury to Libertazzi freed up a spot in the line-up, to the point where the latter will find reclaiming his place no longer the formality it has been in previous seasons. Padovan’s fine form has led to further progression in the Azzurrini set-up as well, with U-18 coach Alberigo Evani giving him his debut against the Ukraine last week, at the Memorial Valentin Granatkin tournament in St. Petersburg. His scoring streak continued, with the player netting two more goals and playing 80 minutes during Italy’s 5-0 victory.
 

The Bianconeri leadership has changed its approach over the last two years, Beppe Marotta making clear the desire to see young players such as Schiavone and Padovan progress to the first team, and investing heavily in players for the Settore Giovanile once again. By also providing coaches of a standard befitting the genuine quality now found within the junior squads, Juventus finally have men in whom they can entrust the future of these players. Now they must continue to deliver.

Al Kass International Cup

Starting today – January 9 – Juventus Under-17′s, led by Fabrizio Del Rosso will take part in the Al Kass International Cup, hosted by Al Kass, the Aspire Zone Foundation and the Qatar Football Association. It is the first edition of an annual event that the nation hopes to use as its first foray into international football in the build-up to the World Cup 2022. Below are the players, drawn largely from the Bianconeri’s Allievi squad, chosen to represent the club in the tournament that ends on January 17 and features teams such as Ajax, Barcelona and PSG.

Goalkeepers: Gianmarco Vannucchi, Leonardo Citti

Defenders: Rodolfo Cifarelli, Pol Garcia, Alessandro Mannai, Filippo Penna, Michele Somma, Christian Tavanti

Midfielders: Stefano Antezza, Eros Castelletto, Fabio Coviello, Dejan Danza, Matteo Gerbaudo, Federico Mattiello

Forwards: Simone Agostini , Edoardo Ceria, Stefano De Crescenzo, Zoran Josipovic, Gabriele Moncini, Giuseppe Ponsat

In bocca al lupo ragazzi!