How five Serie A academies missed the striker now haunting Inter
Nicolò Tresoldi's first coach explains why Atalanta, Milan, Fiorentina, Bologna and Juventus all turned down the forward who scored a hat-trick against Inter at San Siro.
Nicolò Tresoldi scored three times as Club Brugge beat Inter 4-3 at San Siro in the Champions League, a result that has put the 22-year-old forward on the radar of both Italy and Germany for international selection.
The story of how he got there runs through a youth pitch in Gubbio, where Marco Bedini coached him at Fontanelle at the age of 12, before five Italian clubs passed on signing him.
Football Italia reports that La Gazzetta dello Sport spoke to Bedini, who said Atalanta, Milan, Fiorentina, Bologna and Juventus all gave Tresoldi trials and all rejected him, telling the club they already had players of that calibre.
"He had trials with Atalanta, Milan, Fiorentina, Bologna and Juventus, but they all said 'we've already got players of that level,' and rejected him," Bedini said. "They said it to me as well. Nico would return to Gubbio as if nothing had happened and just continue scoring goals."
Why Italian clubs looked past a goalscorer
The common thread in every rejection, according to Bedini, was physical profile rather than output. Tresoldi was deployed as a centre-forward despite lacking what Bedini called the height and structure typical of strikers at that level.
That matters because the centre-forward role in most academy systems is still screened heavily on frame and projected physicality, on the assumption that a target man or penalty-area poacher will need to win physical duels as he grows.
Bedini's account suggests the five clubs were selecting for that profile and filtering out a smaller forward even as he outscored opponents two years older than him.
There was also a technical dimension working against conventional scouting logic: Tresoldi had come late to structured football, having split his time with tennis, and built his game instincts through five-a-side football as much as the eleven-a-side academy pathway.
Five-a-side demands constant scanning and quick decision-making in tight spaces, and Bedini said that background carried over directly, noting that Tresoldi made a difference in those games too.
His father Emanuele played as a defender at Siena, but the son was always pushed forward into the number nine role rather than inheriting a defensive profile, reinforcing that his finishing instincts were specific to him rather than a family template.
The making of a penalty-box striker
Bedini's most concrete tactical detail concerns movement inside the box. He said Tresoldi could score with his right foot, his left, headers, or by finding gaps inside the penalty area, and that this versatility was present even at 12.
That range of finishing method is unusual for a young forward and points to a player reading the box rather than relying on a single strength, which is typically the distinguishing trait between a raw scorer and a reliable one as levels rise.
Bedini also revealed that Tresoldi modelled himself on Filippo Inzaghi, and that specific training sessions were built around teaching him Inzaghi's style of movement inside the area, timing runs to exploit blind spots rather than simply outmuscling defenders.
That training detail reframes the physical rejection from the five clubs: the player they turned down was already being coached toward a movement-based, off-the-shoulder profile rather than the bulkier target-man mould they were scouting for.
The family's move to Germany in 2017 followed his mother's airline job, and Tresoldi joined the Hannover 96 academy the following year, continuing his development outside the Italian system that had already passed on him five times.
Bedini said the player still returns to Fontanelle to see old friends and remains connected to Gubbio, but could not say whether he would ultimately choose Italy or Germany at international level, saying only that it would come down to how he feels.
Given that Tresoldi is known to support Milan, scoring a hat-trick against Inter at San Siro carried extra weight for him personally, a detail Bedini highlighted when asked about the player's attachment to Italian football.
Club Brugge's result at San Siro means Tresoldi now has a Champions League hat-trick against a Serie A side on record, a result that will keep the question of his international future, and the five clubs that once said no to him, firmly in view.