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Giovinco's agent continues to question omission from Italy's Euro team

John E. Sokolowski / USA TODAY Sports

Sebastian Giovinco's agent is still baffled about the Toronto FC player's exclusion from Italy's Euro 2016 squad.

The 29-year-old, who left Juventus to join the Canadian team in 2015, found himself on the outside looking in as Italy competed valiantly in France before the country's elimination at the hands of Germany in the semi-final.

Despite manager Antonio Conte's warning that players competing in North America would face a harder time making the 23-man team, Giovinco's agent, Andrea D'Amico, questions why the former Juve gaffer would leave the in-form player off the squad despite his impressive scoring record.

"Considering that over the course of the season he had scored more goals than the whole of the Italy attack, and that Conte was the man who really wanted him at Juventus, the decision (to leave him out) seemed to be quite unmotivated," D'Amico said to Italian television network Mediaset, as translated by ESPNFC.

"You've got a lad who was the top goal scorer in his first year in America, who provided lots of assists and the player who scored the second best goal in a league which is certainly not like the Chinese one.

"I never saw any technical explanation for it. It's nothing to do with distance either, because if that were the case then all of the Argentinians who play in Italy wouldn't be considered for their country either."

During his debut season, Giovinco was named Major League Soccer's MVP after scoring 22 goals in 33 matches while leading TFC to the playoffs for the first time in the team's history.

He's started the 2016 in similar form after bulging the back of the net eight times despite missing some time with an adductor injury in June.

Now that a new manager is in charge, following Conte's departure to Chelsea, Giovinco's international career may not be over if new manager Giampiero Ventura is willing to give him an opportunity.

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