Gianluca Busio will head into the November World Cup qualifiers riding a good run of form that could help him break into the U.S. men’s national team starting lineup, and Sunday he delivered once again in a big win for Venezia.
Busio played the full match and was one of Venezia’s better players in a dramatic 3-2 win over AS Roma. The 19-year-old played 90 minutes, delivering three key passes as he completed 41 of 45 total passes while contributing three tackles defensively.
Venezia went into Sunday’s match against Roma as the clear underdog, but scored just three minutes into the contest to set the tone early in Venice. Roma responded with a pair of goals just before halftime, but Venezia shook that off in the second half. A 65th-minute penalty kick followed by a David Okoreke winner in the 74th-minute helped Venezia secure its first win over Roma since the 1998/1999 season.
Busio has continued to play a prominent role for the newly-promoted Italian side, and has started five consecutive matches since returning from international duty with the USMNT in October.
Busio only played in one of the three October qualifiers, coming on as a second-half substitute in the win against Costa Rica, but he will be in contention to take on a more prominent role in November’s qualifiers against Mexico and Jamaica.
Venezia jumped up to 15th place in Serie A with the win heading into the international break looking like a team capable of staying up, while Roma slipped into sixth place after its second straight defeat.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=higdGB_jvhg
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A 19-year-old, playing 90 minutes in midfield, on a bottom Serie A team, developing the strong underdog fight and mental toughness that the USMNT needs, delivering key passes and winning against a team like Roma (with Abraham, Cristante, José Mourinho etc) is massive. Absolutely massive!!
#RESPECT
Yeah- this is one of my favorite stories of the season. Just seems the very perfect place for a player of Busio’s makeup to develop and maximize his talent. As players like Lletget age out- its pretty thrilling to have young options like this with his potential waiting in the wings. Hope he stays hungry and maintains this trajectory. 5 years ago he would have been absolutely inundated with media attention and unrealistic expectations- this year it’s one of many- more a side-story. Thank goodness for that!
Full disclosure, AS Roma fan here. I fully intend to watch the game when I get a chance. I’m looking forward to seeing how the US guys played, but can’t say I’m thrilled about the result. Seeing Lazio ahead of Roma is always painful since the Giallorossi don’t win a lot of scudetti, our only consolidation is to try and elbow Lazio aside in the table (I know it’s sad). At least the point were t dropped at home and it sounds like the US kids played an important role.
Busio was brilliant in this game. He had 2 great touch passes that were almost goals. Another game where he played the full 90. He also had 2 great cornerkicks that almost resulted in goals. He should take cornerkicks for the USMNT. I can’t remember if he did any during the gold cup but I remember not being impressed by his free kicks. Anyways, Busio a good one for the pool
Yes he took corners for the NT.
Minor understatement to say Italy seems to be doing wonders for this kid.
One wishes the same were true of Tanner Tessman. Really wish he was getting more minutes as well.
He’s actually starting to get minutes for them. He came in I think around the 76th minute in this game .
They’re both pretty much the same players they were three months ago. Busio was a much more experienced pro playing twice as many games in MLS. He’s playing in a role very similar to where he played at SKC until this season whereas Tanner is having to learn a new system. I also think people look at Tanner and think he’d be a natural enforcer 6 but he never played that role at FCD he was always the box to box guy of FCD’s dual 6s. Busio has adapted to the speed of play better than Tanner and that’s shown in his minutes. I think Tanner was always bought as a long term project whereas Gianluca is a if we stay up great if not we can turn him for a profit.