Nicolo Tresoldi Delays Italy Switch as Germany Opportunity Awaits

Nicolo Tresoldi is not ready to choose. Not yet.

Several Italian outlets report that the Club Brugge striker has asked the FIGC for more time before committing his international future to Italy, despite weeks of noise suggesting a decision was imminent.

In a meeting with new Italy coach Roberto Mancini and technical director Claudio Ranieri at the FIGC headquarters, the 22-year-old is said to have requested that he not be called up for the upcoming Nations League fixtures. He wants space. And he wants to finish what he started with Germany’s Under-21s.

That stance has put his planned association switch with FIFA on hold for now, according to Gazzetta dello Sport and La Repubblica. The paperwork is ready. It just isn’t moving.

A striker in demand

Tresoldi’s hesitation comes at a time when his club form is doing anything but wavering. At Club Brugge, he has started the season at full tilt: five goals in seven matches, including a sharp finish in Tuesday’s 3-2 Champions League defeat to Aston Villa that underlined his penalty-box instincts once again.

Those performances have fed transfer rumours and stirred interest from multiple federations. At the end of August, Gazzetta reported that Tresoldi had already chosen Italy. In Germany, Bild countered that he remained undecided.

The reality sits somewhere closer to the German version: Tresoldi is still weighing up a choice that could define the next decade of his career.

Roots in three countries, a career in two

His story is layered. Born in Cagliari to an Italian father and Argentinian mother, Tresoldi spent his early childhood in Italy before moving to Germany with his family at 13. He grew up in the German system, came through the academy at Hannover 96, and in 2025 made the jump abroad, joining Club Brugge for €7.5 million.

On the international stage, he has worn German colours since Under-19 level. For the Under-21s, he has 12 goals in 24 appearances – a record that explains why both Germany and Italy are pushing so hard now.

Nagelsmann’s near-miss and Klopp’s looming call

Tresoldi’s rise almost carried him all the way to the World Cup. After an outstanding first season in Brugge, he emerged as a serious candidate for Julian Nagelsmann’s Germany squad. Nagelsmann later admitted just how close it came, describing Tresoldi as “really very close for a long time” and praising him as a forward “who has that special instinct in the penalty area.”

In the end, he stayed home. The message, though, was clear: his “time will come.”

That time might arrive under a different coach. Nagelsmann stepped down after Germany’s disastrous World Cup campaign in the USA, Canada and Mexico. Jürgen Klopp is now in charge and will name his first squad on 17 September. He has not yet spoken publicly about Tresoldi, but the timing of the striker’s decision to delay an Italy switch is hard to ignore.

If Klopp calls, Tresoldi’s dilemma sharpens.

Italy rebuilds, Germany waits

Italy, for their part, are rebuilding again after missing yet another World Cup finals. Mancini has returned to the Azzurri bench with a mandate to refresh an ageing core and drag the team back to major tournaments.

Their upcoming Nations League schedule is brutal: Belgium on 25 September, France on 2 October, and Turkey twice on 28 September and 5 October. Tresoldi will not be there. By his own request.

So the tug-of-war pauses, but it hardly loses intensity. A Cagliari-born striker, raised in Germany, with Argentinian blood, lighting up the Champions League in Bruges, is holding his nerve while two giants wait.

When Klopp reads out that first Germany squad list on 17 September, will Tresoldi’s name finally be on it – and will that be the moment the debate ends?