Nearly two years ago, Mario Gotze was a name on everyone’s lips and shirts. Scoring a goal in the final of a World Cup leads one to the golden pages of sporting annals. And Gotze had done precisely that.
At about the same time, Italian attacker Ciro Immobile transferred to German heavyweights Borussia Dortmund for a hefty €18.5 million. Immobile was part of the Italy side that went out of the 2014 World Cup in group play.
Immobile had scored 23 goals for Torino in 2013/14 and arrived in Brazil bearing expectations to scale the heights of Roberto Baggio, Paolo Rossi and Toto Schillaci.