It’s becoming harder and harder to understand Niccolò Pisilli’s situation at Roma. It’s only been months since the 21-year-old’s coming-out party during the 2024-2025 campaign—and only weeks after a spate of performances for the Azzurrini that may have anointed him the future of both the Italian National Team and the Giallorossi—but Pisilli still finds himself glued to Gian Piero Gasperini’s bench when Serie A is in session. This most recent international break has seen Pisilli score yet another
world-class goal for the Azzurrini, making the contrast between his prominence with Italy’s U-21s and his near-total absence at the club level feel sharper than ever.
Seriously, how can you look at that goal (albeit against fellow U-21 talents) and not start foaming at the mouth for more Pisilli under Gasperini-ball? At a minimum, the Italian national team setup seems to recognize that Pisilli is fast becoming the kind of midfielder who can dictate rhythm, break the back of a defensive line with confidence, and play with personality in a way that truly calls to mind the great Francesco Totti. And yet for Roma, Pisilli continues to be treated like a curiosity: a player talented enough to bring off the bench in emergencies but somehow not trustworthy enough to be part of Gasperini’s regular rotation—a rotation that meanwhile is currently unable to bring offensive energy to match one of the best defenses in Europe.
This isn’t new. As I wrote previously, the challenge facing Pisilli isn’t a lack of ability. That’s made clear from the above clips and several more that you can find on YouTube, X, and the like. Instead, it seems like the true issue here is the tactical rigidity of Gasperini’s system, which demands perfect adherence to structure, positional discipline, and a defensive reliability that young midfielders often learn only through repetition. Pisilli’s strengths aren’t inherently incompatible with Gasperini’s football, but they require a level of calibration the manager seems convinced can only be learned slowly, even by the most promising youngster.
Yet the “slow-cooking” explanation that I provided the last time we checked in on Pisilli feels less convincing to me with each passing week, especially as Pisilli produces performance after performance for the Azzurrini that looks like a player ready in the present moment. Gasperini’s caution may be understandable, but it’s increasingly beginning to look costly.
More than anything, I want the Giallorossi to tread carefully with Pisilli—not with the goal of applying an abundance of caution to protect him from senior football, but with the goal of making sure that he feels valued in Rome. I worry that if Pisilli doesn’t get chances with the senior team soon, we might all be living a familiar nightmare yet again as the siren song of the Premier League comes calling.
The Giallorossi have lived this nightmare before. There is a painful history of talented Roma academy products who seem surplus to requirements in Trigoria, who then become superstars (or at least highly serviceable players) elsewhere. Of course, the most recent and painful example of this is Riccardo Calafiori: dismissed as not ready for the bright lights of the Stadio Olimpico, loaned out, moved on, and now one of Italy’s brightest stars and among Europe’s most coveted defenders.
For now, Roma’s new academy jewel seems patient. He has never made noise in the media suggesting he wants to leave, and Roma’s refusal to entertain Tottenham’s summer offers for him suggests the club still sees him as an important piece of its future. But ambitious footballers, like anyone with ambition in any field, have a way of recognizing when their path is blocked. If Roma continue to give Pisilli next-to-no minutes, his calculus might change quickly, especially while he shines on the international stage as he does.
Roma can’t afford a Calafiori redux. They can’t afford to lose yet another homegrown jewel because the coaching staff couldn’t find room for him in the present while betting on him for the future. The reality is simple: if Pisilli continues to dominate for the Azzurrini while watching Roma matches from the bench, the club may soon have to manage a problem of its own making. For everyone’s sake, the time to integrate him into the starting eleven must be now. Who knows, maybe he’s the missing piece that will turn Roma from being a side with a world-class defense and a middling offense into a side with equally fearsome defense and offense.
