The Dying Breed
Is my favourite archtype of striker disappearing?
Within 15 minutes of the first leg of their play-off semi-final against Palermo, Catanzaro were 2-0 up. The Sicilians, stunned. One man had taken them to the sword, and that was 34-year-old Pietro Iemmello. Catanzaro won the game 3-0, but their veteran striker was the talk of the game.
In the second leg, Palermo won 2-0 but didn’t do enough to turn the game around. Another striker I admire, Joel Pohjanpalo, opened the scoring within two minutes to put pressure on the Giallorossi. Both strikers left me, amongst many, longing for their careers to last forever, not solely because of the man himself, but more focused on a feeling.
From this arose concern, too. I’ve often felt disconnected from the modern game, partly why I’ve pretty much entirely abandoned the Premier League and, reluctantly, only watch Newcastle United. I actually don’t think I could name a starting XI for a Premier League side that isn’t my beloved Newcastle.
Nevertheless, I’m not here to examine modern football or express my feelings towards certain leagues. I’m not spending this week’s newsletter analysing statistics, either. I want to focus on feelings and romance, which to me are more important entirely. The story matters more than the success, after all.
Iemmello and Pohjanpalo’s goals in their latest games are just recent examples of how football sometimes evokes deeper feelings in me, and pushes me down a pathway to hunt for the remaining flashes of a game I connect with more than today’s version.
Discussing the drop in quality between yesteryear and the modern game in Italy is a saturated area, with many people having weighed in on that conversation significantly. Some still bring it up now, some almost daily, too. I don’t want to bang that drum even more because it’s exhausting.
However, the tactical evolution of the modern game has led to changes in the striker role, and many of the archetypes we once loved have begun to disappear. Modern football now requires strikers to press, overload, receive between lines, and offer stronger defensive contributions from the front. The typical forward is no longer there to just score goals, no, but instead, they’re looking for more all-around players. False nines, inverted wingers. It’s all contributed to this.
But my feeling isn’t centred around those at the very top. Erling Haaland is the best striker on the planet and embodies many of the typical traits you’d see in a classic striker, despite playing in a Pep Guardiola team.
My gripe, and thus my nostalgic reflection, focuses on the romance. And I suppose, it focuses more on a subgenre of said archetype. I could bring up strikers from past decades that embody this, and talk about why they’re so good. Pippo Inzaghi, Gabriel Batistuta, Bobo Vieri. The list is long.
The majority of strikers at the top of the modern game no longer evoke a feeling in me like those did. I don’t care for Haaland. The only striker who’s playing at the highest level that I’ve really enjoyed recently is Francesco Pio Esposito.
With that, to find a striker that brings me the feeling I so long for, I’ve had to move away from the top. The reason I started this newsletter with two Serie B strikers is that the subgenre of the striker archetype I so love is the one playing for lower-division and lower-status sides in Italy.
Think Luca Toni at Palermo, Antonio Di Natale at Udinese, Stefan Schwoch at Napoli or Vicenza. Heck, I’ll even mention my love for Daniel Ciofani.
We’re in a position where not only the lack of quality strikers at the highest level in Italy is a concern, but the lower league marksmen are starting to fade. Pietro Iemmello is 34 years old and probably has a few years left. Joel Pohjanpalo is 31, so he has some time. But looking at the younger talents, we’re not seeing many strikers who evoke a feeling like those vintage cult heroes come through. 26-year-old Andrea Adorante at Venezia is the only one I can bring up.
I don’t want to be all doom and gloom about Italian football, either. We have too many people moaning about the situation surrounding it. I try not to add to that discourse. I love Italian football for many, many reasons. And, throughout the divisions, there is a lot of good. I could drop down into C, D and beyond and find strikers I connect with better, too. I’ve loved watching Serie B this year because of various factors, but especially because of Adorante, Iemmello and Pohjanpalo, amongst others. Giacomo Calo, the midfield maestro for Frosinone, and Issa Doumbia at Venezia have been two of my favourites away from the strikers, too.
However, I suppose my ramblings in this week’s newsletter stem from a lack of hope that the game I adore remains. I’m constantly reflecting, hunting for nostalgic snippets of Italian football or hoping for glimmers of romance in the modern game to cling onto. Watching Iemmello against Palermo and then Pohjanpalo in the reverse leg were two glimmers. My heart aches at the fact that I don’t know how many more of those glimmers we have left in the game.
