Two familiar faces are back in Italy’s squad to play England
Gianluigi Buffon and Giorgio Chiellini are back in the Italy squad just four months after announcing their international retirement
Posted Sunday, March 18, 2018 by Dreamteamfc.com
Gianluigi Buffon will still be playing for Italy when we’re all long gone.
Italy’s latest squad for the upcoming friendlies against England and Argentina makes for interesting reading.
Four months after announcing his international retirement Buffon is back.
Buffon has been named as one of Italy’s three goalkeepers along with AC Milan’s Gianluigi Donnarumma and Genoa’s Mattia Perin.
Giorgio Chellini, who followed Buffon in announcing his retirement after Italy failed to make the 2018 World Cup, is also in the squad.
But there is no place in Luigi Di Biagio’s squad for Mario Balotelli who was rumoured to be close to a recall after impressing with Nice.
Chiellini will move up to 98 caps if he plays against both England and Argentina while Buffon will move on to 177 caps.
Buffon is the most capped active player although he’ll have to go some way to reach Egypt midfielder Ahmed Hassan’s all-time record of 184 caps.
At the other end of the spectrum are Patrick Cutrone and Federico Chiesa who have both been called up for the first time.
Cutrone has scored 12 goals in his first full season since graduating through Milan’s academy.
Fiorentina forward Chiesa has scored five goals and could follow in his dad Enrico’s footsteps.
Enrico played 22 times for Italy between 1996 and 2001.
Impressive, but the Chiesa clan still have some way to go to match the Alonso family though.
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