On the 29th of December, Nikita Contini made his Serie A debut, replacing Alex Meret in the second half of Napoli’s scoreless draw against Monza. Meret was forced to exit the match with a hamstring injury, while Napoli’s usual Number 2, Pierluigi Gollini, was kept out of the squad after suffering an ankle injury in the pre-match warm-up. It was a long-time coming for the SSC Napoli veteran.
Nikita Baranovsky Contini was born in Cherkasy, Ukraine to a Ukrainian mother and Neopolitan father. At the age of three, Contini and his family moved to Giugliano in Campania – the same city his father moved to as a child, albeit from the much closer city of Naples.
Formerly a striker, Contini first caught the attention of Napoli’s then goalkeeper trainer Luciano Tarallo in a friendly between Napoli and Atletico Giugliano. The following year, the young shot-stopper completed a successful trial for Napoli’s youth team.
Entering Napoli’s youth system at the age of 12, Contini was quick to impress. Apart from his size (at 1.90 m or 6’3” tall), Contini was calm, agile, positionally sound and capable of playing the ball with both feet.
In his first season at Napoli, Contini won the Best Goalkeeper Award at both the Niccolò Galli tournament in Florence and the Cairo Montenotte tournament in Savona. At 18, he led Napoli to the final of the Beppe Viola-Arco di Trento tournament, winning the Best Goalkeeper Award there as well. In the 2013/14 UEFA Youth League, Contini was applauded by the German home crowd after a brilliant double save in the first half.
But his path to Serie A was not without its bumps. Contini missed the majority of the 2011/12 Giovanissimi Nazionali (U15) campaign due to a torn meniscus in his right knee, suffered in training after colliding with Gennaro Tutino – another highly touted Napoli prospect who has struggled to to become a fixture in Serie A.
In 2013, Contini thought he got his first call-up to the senior team. He was asked by Rafa Benitez to be ready for travel to Turin for their clash with Juventus as goalkeeper Rafael was suffering with back pain. However, Rafael recovered at the last minute and Contini missed both the senior team’s match against their bitter rivals and the Primavera’s match against Palermo.
It wasn’t long before that first call-up arrived, ironically to play against his future club, Sampdoria. That was the first of seven call-ups Contini would get for the senior team between 2014 and 2015, but he never had the pleasure of playing. Despite making the senior team in 2020/21, Contini never featured. In fact, Contini did not play a single match for any Serie A squad until last season. He started in goal for Sampdoria’s Coppa Italia match against Ascoli, and what a match it was.
The Sampdoria keeper might have been more aggressive off his line to prevent Ascoli from scoring a 33rd-minute equalizer. However, moments before the break, Contini made an important save on Ascoli striker Pedro Mendez to protect the draw.
Neither side scored in the second half, so the match would be decided by extra time and a penalty shootout, if required. There was little Contini could do to stop Francesco Donati’s low strike to give Ascoli the lead ten minutes before the end of time. But, with Sampdoria on the brink of elimination, Francesco Caputo headed in the equalizer in the 118th minute, forcing a penalty shootout.
After ten rounds settling nothing, the goalkeepers stepped up to the spot to settle the match. Contini sent Enrico Guarna the other way before making a brilliant, left-handed save, diving to his right to stop the Ascoli keeper. Thus, Sampdoria advanced to the Round of 16, where Contini played the full 90 minutes in a 1-0 defeat to Fiorentina.
It wasn’t Contini’s first success with penalty kicks. In 2012, the goalkeeper dragged Napoli’s youth team into the final of the Beppe Viola-Arco di Trento tournament with a penalty shootout victory over Inter. Three years later, Contini made his Primavera debut after Napoli goalkeeper Diamante Cristino was sent off. Contini was introduced for the penalty kick and made the save.
The Coppa Italia match against Fiorentina was Contini’s last for a Serie A club, until last Friday. This upcoming Sunday, Contini could make his first ever Serie A start, though Gollini is expected to recover ahead of the match against Torino.
