Francesco Bardi is running out of chances

Things haven’t been going all that well for the ambitious young goalkeeper in recent seasons. After signing a contract with Inter once he left the Livorno youth system in 2011 he had three loan spells with Novara and Livorno (twice) in which he was playing regularly. Then for the 14/15 season he was sent to Chievo Verona and things began to go south. Their first coach of the season, Eugenio Corini, played Bardi but once he was replaced in October by Rolando Maran, Bardi was dropped for Albano Bizzarri. As a result of this the Italian goalkeeper only made 10 appearances that season. This past season he decided to go abroad and signed on loan for La Liga side Espanyol, but that went even worse than his time with Chievo Verona. By the January transfer window Bardi had made no La Liga appearances and had only played twice in the Copa Del Rey. Inter decided to pull him out early and sent him to Frosinone, where ironically he also only played in two matches.

Now the 24 year old is heading back to Frosinone for the 16/17 season on loan, but this time the club has an option to buy included in the contract. If he performs fairly well I would not be surprised to see them exercise that option to buy since it would end their rotation of on-loan goalkeepers and allow them to have some certainty in that position. Just like in the Dimarco loan Inter has a counter-option against that purchasing clause in case Bardi impresses this season.

The reason I started this article calling Bardi an "ambitious young goalkeeper" is because a while back he stated that the only way he would return to Inter is if he was the starting keeper. Do I think that Bardi could serve as a decent backup to Handanovic? Absolutely. Do I think that he is good enough to be the #1 now or anytime in the near future? Absolutely not. Bardi has had 5 seasons to impress and the last two have not been noteworthy in the slightest. When a player has less than 15 appearances with three different teams in two seasons it can’t just be that the coaches like somebody else better, it’s because the player isn’t doing good enough. If he isn’t doing good enough for clubs like Chievo and Espanyol how can he expect to be good enough for Inter. If Francesco wants to every play for Inter he needs to really step up his performances this season. If that doesn’t happen he should start preparing to call Frosinone or some other mid to lower table Serie A (if not Serie B) team home.