Mancini sees Vergara as Italy's right winger of the future

Vergara is a right winger for the future, not the possession-based number eight Massimiliano Allegri had planned for him over the summer. That is the verdict Roberto Mancini delivered after Vergara's convincing display in Italy's game against Turkey. For Italy's head coach, the Frattaminore-born midfielder is the man to build the national team's right flank around for years to come.

The right winger of the future

If Mancini's verdict becomes Allegri's settled view too, the effect on the Napoli squad would be immediate. Allegri already has David Neres, Matteo Politano and Giovane for the right-hand side. Add Vergara as a candidate for the same role and the position suddenly has four players competing for one shirt — a surplus that would force the club to trim the squad, not strengthen it.

Giovane is the first name mentioned as making way. On the other flank, Noa Lang could also move on: four appearances, 184 minutes, no goals so far this season, already priced at €20m for January and watched by Galatasaray. Lang's departure would let Neres switch to the left when needed, and would free a forward's slot regardless of what happens with Lorenzo Lucca, signed from Udinese for €35m and still without a goal this season after a pointed warning from his agent, Riso.

These are scenarios, not decisions. The transfer window has been shut since 1 September and the next one does not open until 2 January, so none of this changes anything in the short term.

The injury that changes everything

More urgent than any of it: in the same Turkey match that impressed Mancini, Vergara asked to be substituted with a calf problem, later confirmed as a mid-grade strain of the right soleus. He will miss the league game with Frosinone, the Champions League trip to Villarreal and the league trip to Venezia. Any experiment on the right flank has to wait.

Allegri, for his part, has not even settled on a formation. In training at Castel Volturno — Napoli's training ground — he confirmed the 4-3-3 in a friendly with Avellino, but has also tried a three-man defence and a new 4-2-3-1 designed to fit De Bruyne, Vergara and Højlund into the same team. The decisions keep sliding from week to week, while Napoli sit ninth with 7 points. President De Laurentiis went to Castel Volturno in person on Monday 5 October to ask about a start of two wins, one draw and three defeats across the league and Champions League.

The last word belongs to Allegri, not to Coverciano, Italy's national-team training centre — he is the one who decides how to use the players at his disposal and what reinforcements to request in January. First, though, Napoli simply need Vergara back on the pitch. The countdown over the right flank only resumes after Venezia, with Napoli-Bodø/Glimt at the Maradona on 20 October.