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Graziano Pellè saw red. He knew what was coming even before Cuco Martina, FC Twente’s buccaneering right-back, drilled home Twente’s second to secure a 2-2 draw in a game where Feyenoord had boasted a two-goal ascendancy.
Ronald Koeman could only watch in shock and disbelief, his mouth wide open in the shape of an “O”. Pellè marched into the bowels of the De Grolsch Veste Stadion and kicked everything in his bitter sight. The cameras, the walls and the doors all bowed to his anger.
It is this fire which has formed the potent component that is Pellè, Southampton Football Club’s envied number 19. Finally, after floating through Europe in nomadic fashion, Pellè is where he has always wanted to be.
A breath of fresh air at St Mary’s
His contribution to Southampton’s exciting start to the season has been substantial, registering four goals and an assist in seven Premier League outings. Yet there is more to the Italian’s game than mere goals – there is the power, the imposing physical frame, the aggression, the passion and the unerring skill. Queens Park Rangers would no doubt atest.
He arrived wondering whether he was commiting to a step down in his career after guiding Feyenoord to the UEFA Champions League, following a second-placed finish in the Dutch Eredivisie, and the mass exodus which preceded his obscured acquisition, worth a bargain £8 million. Dejan Lovren, Adam Lallana, Luke Shaw and Rickie Lambert had all departed to sample greater challenges. Morgan Schneiderlin was threatening to leave but it was an import, rather than an export, at St Mary’s which most engaged Pellè.
It was the managerial appointment of Koeman which convinced Pellè to relinquish the glorious opportunity of starring in the Champions League among Europe’s elite. It was the Dutchman who rescued Pellè from failing to satisfy his immense potential. At 26, time was running out for a desperate Pellè before he joined Feyenoord.
A difficult past
Ask the Italian of his most detested aspect of football and his answer will be delivered in an unerringly knowing tone exuding conviction. “The loan system,” he would say without hesitation nor compunction. It stagnated his career from its early stages. His three years at Lecce in Italy, his hometown club, were endured elsewhere at Catania, Crotone and Cesena, three lower-league clubs.
Pellè needing love and appreciation, severed all ties with Lecce, who were primed to loan him out to Palermo, and moved to AZ Alkmaar to sample a different lifestyle and, more importantly, as he believed, to finally make his mark and move to a club where young talent was treasured, nurtured and their skills honed.
Yet proceedings did not acquiesce to plans for a discontented Pellè, the Italian returning to Italy and moving to Parma in Serie B and ultimately helping Parma into the Serie A.
Joy at last
Pellè’s nomadic search for success, despite this relatively gratifying achievement, led him to return to Holland, joining Feyenoord. It was the first time where Pellè had felt valued and treasured, receiving the appreciation which had swayed him to and fro from Italy and Holland.
That is why Pellè’s Italy national team call-up is largely indebted to Koeman, the first to instill unerring faith in the discontented striker. It speaks volumes that, at Mario Balotelli’s expense, Pellè was included in Antonio Conte’s squad for the Euro 2016 qualifiers against Azerbaijan and Malta.
And deservedly so. Like Rickie Lambert, who he was acquired to replace, Pellè is a late bloomer at the experienced age of 29 and has impressed since his arrival from the Eredivisie, scoring four in seven Premier League games. Physically imposing and a hard-working target man, his armoury does not end there. There is also the skill, which his incredible moment of genius against Queens Park Rangers was testament to.
His vision is exemplary. Even before Dusan Tadic, a fellow arrival from the Dutch Eredivisie, rose above QPR’s Armand Traore, Pellè knew what was coming, swirling his body, holding off the challenges of Steven Caulker and controlling the ball with his left foot, and emphatically volleying it into the right top corner, beyond Robert Green’s despaired reach.
Lapping up the adulation from the terraces at St Mary’s, Pellè, winged by Tadic and Sadio Manè, ran across to the corner flag which swayed impotently in the breeze. Elevating his right foot, he struck it firmly, evoking memories when he lashed out at the De Grolsh Veste Stadion a year ago. Yet this time it was in elation and relief, after an enervating quest for appreciation and love.
