Nicolo Tresoldi Delays Italy Switch Amid Germany Interest

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.

The 22-year-old met new Italy coach Roberto Mancini and technical director Claudio Ranieri at the FIGC headquarters. Rather than seal the long-discussed switch, Tresoldi is said to have requested that he not be called up for the upcoming Nations League fixtures and that his association change with FIFA be put on hold.

For now, he wants to finish what he started with Germany’s Under-21s. According to Gazzetta dello Sport and La Repubblica, that wish has been respected, and the paperwork has been pushed to the back burner.

A striker in demand

Tresoldi could hardly have chosen a more delicate moment to hesitate. At Club Brugge he is in form, and everyone has noticed.

Five goals in seven games this season. Another strike on Tuesday night in a wild 3-2 Champions League defeat to Aston Villa. Those numbers sit on top of an outstanding first campaign in Belgium that already had scouts and national-team staff circling.

The noise reached a peak at the end of August. Gazzetta reported that Tresoldi had opted for Italy. In Germany, Bild countered that the former Hannover forward remained undecided. The tug-of-war has been public, and it has been intense.

Born in Cagliari to an Italian father and Argentinian mother, Tresoldi spent his early childhood in Italy before moving to Germany at 13. He joined the Hannover 96 system and climbed through the ranks there, a classic academy story with an international twist. In 2025, Club Brugge paid €7.5 million to bring him to Belgium.

On the international stage, his record with Germany’s youth teams is clear. Since the Under-19s, he has worn the DFB shirt. For the Under-21s, he has 12 goals in 24 appearances – a return that explains why Germany are in no hurry to let him go.

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

His rise almost carried him all the way to the last World Cup. Julian Nagelsmann, then Germany coach, considered Tresoldi right up to the wire.

“He was really very close for a long time,” Nagelsmann admitted. The striker, he said, is a player “who has that special instinct in the penalty area”. In the end, Tresoldi stayed home, but Nagelsmann made it clear he believed “his time will come”.

That time might be approaching again, only under a different man.

Nagelsmann resigned after Germany’s disastrous World Cup in the USA, Canada and Mexico. Jürgen Klopp has stepped in and will announce his first squad on 17 September. He has not yet gone public with any view on Tresoldi, but the situation is obvious: a prolific, dual-national No. 9, already embedded in the DFB system, is hesitating over Italy while Germany reshapes itself.

The opportunity is there if Klopp wants to grab it.

Italy’s rebuild meets a waiting game

On the other side, Italy are rebuilding from another World Cup failure of their own. Mancini has returned to the Azzurri bench tasked with dragging a fallen giant back to major tournaments and deep into them.

The schedule is unforgiving. In the coming international window, Italy face Belgium on 25 September, France on 2 October, and Turkey twice on 28 September and 5 October in the Nations League. These are the kind of games in which a penalty-box predator could make himself indispensable.

Instead, Tresoldi has asked to stay away. No call-up. No FIFA switch. Not yet.

So the story pauses here: a Cagliari-born, Germany-raised striker, scoring freely for Club Brugge, courted by two giants in need of fresh blood. Italy wait. Germany watch. Tresoldi scores.

The next squad list – and the next phone call – will tell us which anthem he plans to hear for the rest of his career.