‘Currently unrivalled…Best midfielder in the country’- Highest praise for Sandro Tonali | OneFootball

Italian football was stunned when Sandro Tonali decided to leave them in summer 2023.

All but unheard of for Serie A to lose one of their best homegrown talents at such a young age to an overseas league.

Ever since that happened in summer 2023, the Italian media have been embarrassingly making up story after story claiming that Sandro Tonali is going to make an imminent return to domestic Italian football.

Journalist in Italy simply knowing that this is what football fans want to hear, so they feed them these stories despite absolutely no substance.

Last season was especially bizarre, as the better and better Sandro Tonali played for Newcastle United and Italy, the greater the returning to Serie A stories became, in both quantity and intensity.

The daftness summed up perfectly when in the January transfer window it was claimed Newcastle United would be prepared to let Sandro Tonali go on loan to a Serie A club and potentially subsidise his wages. That makes perfect sense, Eddie Howe with a small squad and hoping to win a cup and qualify for the Champions League to not only let one of his best players leave mid-season but also on loan, no massive transfer fee for a Sandro Tonali replacement.

Which of course also begs the question, if you had loads of cash, where would you even find a replacement for our brilliant midfielder?

Interesting to read stuff in the Italian media now.

I think they have pretty much accepted at last that making up stories claiming Sandro Tonali is ‘coming home’, just makes them look beyond ridiculous, considering how brilliant and essential he is for Newcastle United.

Sandro Tonali has simply got better and better playing under Eddie Howe and facing the intensity of Premier League football week after week.

This sums up how the Italian media now see the NUFC and Italy star (although the English media lagging behind them…), Football Italia reporting on Sandro Tonali, following Italy’s 5-0 victory over Estonia:

‘An all-round performance for the Newcastle midfielder who made five key passes, had a 91% passing accuracy and won five ground duels from six.

A year on from his return to action, the former Milan star is now stamping his authority as the best midfielder in the country.

Against Estonia, where he lined up alongside Inter’s Nicolò Barella, Tonali looked the sharper of the two.

Barella delivered a solid display, but couldn’t catch the quality, stamina and resilience shown by the Newcastle man.

Tonali can either play as a Regista (ED: Apparently, a ‘Regista’ is an Italian term for a deep-lying playmaker who operates in front of the defence, dictating play by controlling the tempo and linking defence with attack through creative and intelligent passing) or a box-to-box midfielder for the Azzurri, as his quality on the ball is currently unrivalled in Italian football.’