There have been times during his reign at Aston Villa where fans of the Premier League high-flyers could have been forgiven for assuming Unai Emery was capable of transforming a simple bottle of Volvic into the finest Malbec.
The former Arsenal and PSG coach has turned Douglas Luiz into one of the finest and most complete central midfielders in European football. Ollie Watkins, Ezri Konsa, Boubacar Kamara and John McGinn have played the finest stuff of their careers under Emery too, while Leon Bailey has gone from expensive flop to a winger more than worthy of his £30 million price-tag.
So when Nicolo Zaniolo joined on a loan deal from Galatasaray last summer, who better than Emery to put one of the continent’s wayward talents back on the right track again?
Despite an equaliser against West Ham United last time out, however, the Italian has been one of the few disappointments of the Emery era, the £19 million option-to-buy clause in his Villa Park contract seemingly destined to go un-triggered barring a dramatic upturn in form.
Nicolo Zaniolo looks likely to leave Aston Villa
So, presuming Zaniolo will be on his way back to Galatasaray come the summer, the simple question is; what’s next?
“He has always made me very angry,” Luigi Cagni, the veteran Italian who has coached the likes of Empoli, Genoa and Brescia, tells Tuttomercatoweb. “He has incredible qualities but he doesn’t always put them on the field.”
Cagni agrees with Italy coach Luciano Spalletti, who said before Christmas that Zaniolo needs to improve on his ‘self-discipline’ if he is to fulfil the potential that made him perhaps the greatest Italian talent of his generation at one point.
“You always have to be a professional,” Cagni adds. “As he grows up, I hope he understands that football is a profession where it is difficult to always maintain the same level. You have to understand that it’s a hard, all-round job. If you do it well it’s a tiring job.
“He has incredible qualities. (But) he’s one of the (players) who drove me crazy when he was well. Someone like that makes you win matches.”
Zaniolo has made 20 Premier League appearances for Aston Villa but 13 of those have come from the bench. The one-time Inter Milan starlet admits, in an interview with Gazzetta dello Sport, that he would be open to a fresh start in Serie A, albeit while ruling out an ‘unthinkable’ move to Roma’s arch rivals Lazio.
But what about a return to Fiorentina for a player who spent six years in the Viola academy until 2016?
Second spell at Fiorentina mooted for Italy ace
“This could be an interesting operation,” thinks Giocondo Martorelli , who works as an agent in Italy (Radio Firenze Viola). “I believe he is a player still capable of reach very high levels. Spalletti lets him play (for Italy) even though he isn’t playing much at Aston Villa.
“I know him well because in the Fiorentina youth team he played with my son. So I can say that he is a player with formidable talent.
“For this reason, if I were at Fiorentina, I would make this bet but before the European Championships. It is an operation that must be done immediately.”
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