Report: Giorgio Chiellini signing a contract extension is a ‘formality’

The number of players who have been around since the beginning of Juventus’ current run of dominance in Serie A can be counted on one hand these days. But, with that said, it doesn’t look like Juve’s current Old Guard isn’t going to be disassembling come the summer time (no matter what happens with the current season).

First came the report last week that Gianluigi Buffon looks set to extend his comeback to Juventus for another season and get closer and closer to playing in his mid-40s. Same goes for the man who took over the captain’s armband from Buffon nearly two years ago.

According to La Gazzetta dello Sport (via VecchiaSignora.com), Giorgio Chiellini will be signing on and tacking another season onto his current deal that is set to expire at the end of the current campaign (whenever that may be at this point). And La Gazzetta takes things a step further than what we heard about regarding Buffon signing an extension, too. According to the report, Chiellini signing a contract extension is pretty much a “formality” at this point — which isn’t all that surprising seeing as the man is healthy again after around six months and obviously still very good at his job when he is on the field.

Basically, while Chiellini is 6 ¹⁄₂ years younger than Buffon, the vision for next season appears to be the same: playing on.

Chiellini, whose days recently have involved brokering the agreement that saw Juventus players and high-ranking coaches forgo €90 million worth of salary, has had an eventful season to say the least. That’s before you factor in that Juventus went out and signed his probable successor in Matthijs de Ligt last summer — a move that is looking quite smart right now, by the way — and there was bound to be a bit of an interesting conundrum to come with that. But, seeing as Chiellini had to undergo major knee surgery the second week of the season, all of that was put on the back burner once he went under the knife. And now that the season has been put on hold and Chiellini is back healthy, it might be actually a positive that his recently operated on knee gets a little extra rest.

Regardless of that, Chiellini signing on for at least one more season after this current one ends (or is called off or goes into the atmosphere and is never heard from again) isn’t all that much of a surprise even though he has sustained a serious injury in recent months. The fact that he is back healthy again and showing no ill effects of said major knee surgery is a pretty good sign that Chiellini will be trying to play into his late 30s.

And that, for Juventus, is a good sign.