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Salento club may not have a storied history but players did not have to stay long to make their mark By Michele Tossani for The Gentleman Ultra Picking five players for a rational Lecce side should be easy, on paper. Salentini are a club that first stood in Serie A in 1985-86, which is relatively recent. The first Lecce game I remember was the 2-2 that the newly promoted side imposed on the then Campioni d’Italia of Verona in September 1985. But Lecce are a club that featured great players. So, in the end, building Lecce’s five-a-side lineup was not as easy as expected to be. A true force between the posts, the current starting goalkeeper Wladimiro Falcone has been a key part of the side that was able to avoid relegation in the past two years. Not so strong with the ball at his feet, Falcone is a dominant shot-stopper. Should his football career go bad Falcone will probably be able to live a life as an actor. In fact, Falcone made some appearances as a child in the movie Viaggi di Nozze (of the well-known Italian comedian Carlo Verdone) and in some television shows as well. Other notable keepers that have worn the Lecce shirt include the great Fabrizio Lorieri (an underrated netminder), the former Roma and Juventus keeper Antonio Chimenti and the former Torino and Milan keeper Giuliano Terraneo. Giuseppe Gatta, six years keeper with Lecce, also deserves a mention. Can you be in a nostalgic Lecce five-a-side team as a player that lasted just one season? Yes, if you are a world champion and a player such as Samuel Umtiti. The Frenchman was probably the best all-around player at Lecce. He barely played at 100% due to injuries, but his 70% was enough to dominate every opponent. In January 2023, Sergej Milinkovic-Savic came to town with Lazio as the best Serie A midfielder but he was largely nullified by Umtiti, who often broke the line to jump ahead. By picking Umtiti I had to leave out Lorenzo Stovini (an underrated defender who deserved a much more prominent career), Marco Cassetti (the first Lecce player to be called-up by Italy) or Marco Baroni (who kept Lecce in Serie A as player and as coach). A player who could compete with Umtiti for Lecce’s best player ever, Beto, mina la bomba (Beto, shoot the bomb) was a common ultras chant over the years when Juan Barbas was in Salento. The Argentinian was a technically skilled midfielder, specialising in free-kicks. He scored twice in the Roma 2-3 Lecce match that cost romanisti the 1986 Scudetto. I could have selected Franco Causio (who won the World Cup with Italy in 1982), Francesco Moriero, Guillermo Giacomazzi, Luigi Piangerelli or Alessandro Conticchio but none had the qualities of Barbas. Sign up to Football Daily Kick off your evenings with the Guardian's take on the world of football after newsletter promotion Pedro Pasculli joined Lecce in 1985 alongside Barbas as the foreign players for the club’s first Serie A campaign (only two overseas players were allowed back then). Despite relegation in 1986, Pasculli was selected by Carlos Bilardo for the Argentina team that would become world champions in Mexico. Pasculli played an important role in Argentina’s victory, scoring the sole goal to beat Uruguay in the last 16. Lecce fans have the chance to see a lot of great forwards. Other than the aforementioned Pasculli, Mirko Vucinic, Davor Vugrinec, Cristiano Lucarelli, Valeri Bojinov and Pietro Paolo Virdis all played for the club. But Javier Chevantón was the one that stole giallorossi hearts. With 58 goals in all competitions, the Uruguayan had three stints at Lecce. In his final one, with the club in Serie C, Chevantón came off the bench to play with a broken arm against Carpi in the playoff finals.