Italy's top domestic league, theSerie A, is one of the most popular professional sports leagues in the world because it is often depicted as the most tactical national football league, and is among the top five European football leagues. Italy's club sides have won 48 major European trophies, making them the second most successful nation in European football.Serie A hosts three of the world's most famous clubs asJuventus,Milan, andInter, all founding members of theG-14, a group which represented the largest and most prestigious European football clubs; Serie A was the only league to produce three founding members.
Juventus, Milan, and Inter (the Big Three), along withRoma,Lazio,Fiorentina and historicallyParma, but now replaced byNapoli are known as theSeven Sisters of Italian football due to their popular support and dominance in league and cups between the 1990s and 2020s.[nb 1] Italian managers are among the most successful in European football, especially in competitions such asthe Champions League. More players have won the covetedBallon d'Or award while playing in Serie A than any other league in the world afterLa Liga.
Illustration of a game ofcalcio fiorentino from 1688
Other forms offootball were played in Italy in ancient times, the earliest of which wasHarpastum, played during the times of theRoman Empire.[15] This game may have also been influential in other forms throughout Europe due to the expansion of the Roman Empire, includingMedieval football. From the 16th century onwards,calcio fiorentino, another code of football distinct from the modern game, was played in the Piazza Santa Croce inFlorence.[16][17] Some famous Florentines were among the players of the game, particularly theMedici family includingPiero,Lorenzo, andAlessandro de' Medici,[18] as well as popes who played the game in the Vatican, such asClement VII,Leo XI, andUrban VIII.[18] The namecalcio ("kick") was later adopted for football in Italy (attested first in 1889, "Il Foot-ball ovvero il Giuoco del Calcio"), becoming the synonym for Italian association football worldwide,[19][20][21] as well as the most popular sport in Italy.[22]
The modern variation of the game was brought to Italy during the 1880s.Edoardo Bosio, a merchant worker in the British textile industry, had visited England and experienced the game. He returned to Turin in 1887 and was motivated to help spread football in his homeland. He founded the first football club in Italy (Torino Football and Cricket Club) that year, whileNobili Torino (Turin Nobles) soon followed.[23] The second club bore the name noble because it containedLuigi Amedeo, Duke of the Abruzzi, and Alfonso Ferrero de Gubernatis Ventimiglia, who would later become president of theItalian Football Federation (FIGC). The two merged in 1891 to form Internazionale Football Club Torino.[24][25]Genoa Cricket and Football Club, formed as a cricket club to represent England abroad, was founded by Englishmen in 1893. In 1896, a man namedJames Richardson Spensley arrived inGenoa and introduced the football section of the club, becoming its first manager.[26]Genoa is the oldest Italian football club still active and the one in possession of the oldest founding document.
Some early tournaments were organised by theItalian Gymnastics Federation (FGI, later named FGNI,Federazione Ginnastica Nazionale Italiana)) between 1895 and 1897 and until 1913. In 1898, a new federation, the future FIGC but then known as Federazione Italiana del Foot-ball (FIF) until 1909,[27] was formed, centred originally inTurin. The FIF first president was Mario Vicary.
The FIGC created theItalian Football Championship with the four founding clubs being; Genoa,Torinese,Ginnastica Torino, and Internazionale Torino. Its first competition, the1898 Italian Football Championship, was held at theVelodrome Humbert I in Turin on 8 May 1898, and was won by Genoa. Genoa won the Italian Football Championship on five out of six occasions, interrupted byAC Milan in 1901. While it was common for clubs to compete in both FIGC and FGNI competitions early on,[25] the titles won in the FIGC championship are the only ones officially recognised by the modern-day league.
From 1904 the replacement tournament calledPrima Categoria was structured into regional groups. Winners of each group participated in a playoff with the eventual winners being declared champions. Between 1905 and 1908, a Final Group among regional champions was contested to award the title and the Spensley Cup.Juventus won his first title and Spensley Cup in 1905, while the following two championships were won byMilan.[28]
In November 1907, the FIF organised two championships for the 1908 season:[29][30][31]
Italian Championship: The main tournament where only Italian players were allowed to play; the winners would be proclaimedCampioni d'Italia (Italian Champions) and would be awarded the Bruni Cup.[32]
Federal Championship: A secondary tournament where foreign players (if they lived in Italy) were also allowed to play; the winners would be proclaimedCampioni Federali (Federal Champions) and would be awarded the Spensley Cup.[32]
The FIF wanted to organise two different championships in order to allow weaker clubs, composed only of Italian players (squadre pure italiane, "pure Italian teams"), to win the national title, and to relegate simultaneously the big clubs, composed mostly of stronger foreign players (squadre spurie internazionali, "spurious international teams") in a minor competition for a "consolation prize".[33][34][35] The majority of big clubs (Genoa, Milan, andTorino) withdrew from both the championships in order to protest against the autocratic policy of the FIF.
The 1908 Italian Championship and the Bruni Cup were won byPro Vercelli, beating Juventus, Doria, andMilanese. The Federal Championship was won by Juventus against Doria,.[36] The Federal Championship won by Juventus was later forgotten by FIGC due to the boycott by the dissident clubs.[37] 1908 also saw a scission within Milan that led to the foundation ofInter.[38]
In the 1909 Italian football season, the two different championships were organised again, with the Oberti Cup in lieu of the Spensley Cup for the Federal Championship. This time, the majority of big clubs decided to only withdraw from the Italian Championship in order to make the Federal competition the most relevant tournament and to diminish the Italian one. The Federal Championship was won by Pro Vercelli, beating Milanese in the Final, while the Italian Championship was won by Juventus, again beating Milanese in the Final.[39] Ultimately, the dissenters' strategy worked out, as the failure of the Italian Championship won by Juventus forced the FIGC to later recognise the Federal Champions of Pro Vercelli as "Campioni d'Italia 1909", disavowing the other tournament and depriving Juventus of another title.[40][nb 2]
The format was modified for the1909–10 Prima Categoria, which was played in a league format. Nine clubs participated, playing each other both home and away. The split between Federal and Italian championship was not completely abolished because, while unifying these tournaments, it was decided for the last time to assign two titles at the end of the season. In fact, the FIGC established to proclaim as Federal Champions (now turned into the main title) the first-placed club in the general classification, while recognised as Italian Champions (now become the secondary title) would be the best placed club among the four "pure Italian teams", depending on the head-to-head matches.[43] At the end of the season, Pro Vercelli and Inter finished joint-top, so a playoff was needed in order to assign the Federal title (the Italian one was won by Pro Vercelli). This season was the first victory for Inter, having defeated Pro Vercelli in the final by a score of 10–3. Even the Italian title won by Pro Vercelli was later forgotten.[44]
A first national competition organised by the Italian Gymnastics Federation (FGNI–FGI) was played in 1896, the same year of the first modernOlympic Games, and won by a team fromUdine, an Italian northeast city in theFriuli-Venezia Giulia region, namedUdinese.[45] In 1897, a second national gymnastic-football tournament was won by SG Torinese.[46] In 1898, the Federazione Italiana del Foot-ball (FIF–FIGC) was finally formed and the first national championship was organised, with regional tournaments and playoffs. Held in Turin on the occasion of theInternational Exhibition for the fiftieth anniversary of theAlbertine Statute,[47][48] with about one hundred spectators in attendance, it included four clubs,[49] three matches,[50] and lasted a single day.[51][52] This is considered to be the first proper national football championship and was won using thePyramid formation (2–3–5) by Genoa,[53][54][55] which then went on to win five more championships in six years.[56]Caffaro, a newspaper in Genoa, headlined "The Genoese winners of the national championship", while another reported that the competitors gathered at a restaurant, where they had dinner and the championship cup was delivered to the winning team.[57] To celebrate the event of the first national football championship, Franco Bernini wrote a book in 2005 entitledLa prima volta.[58][59]
^Even when these lost twoscudetti by Juventus attracted attention into the 21st century, the club did not appeal to have them recognised and the FIGC ignored it, and others, including the prestigiousGuerin Sportivo and Juworld.net,[41][42] questioned the events, saying it is not clear after many years why the only recognised official championship was the one won by Pro Vercelli, and why in practice the Italian Championship was recognised as official for one year and the Federal Championship for another year.[37][41][42] In a 2012 interview to Sky Sport Italia, the thenGuerin Sportivo director Matteo Marani suggested the same solution that was achieved in 1922 when both Pro Vercelli and Novese were recognised as champions, since FIGC recognised as a validscudetto in all respects the one won by Pro Vercelli in a championship organised by a federation (the CCI) that was born in open contrast and opposition to the FIGC itself. He said: "I am not saying that it should be taken away from Pro Vercelli, but two [scudetti] should be given. The [Italian] Football Federation itself, at the moment in which there is a historical act that establishes it, must discuss it, I do not think it can pass in silence."[41]
^abAcerbi, Enrico; Rota, Davide; Schöggl, Hans (2004)."Italy – List of FNGI Champions".RSSSF.Archived from the original on 22 December 2022. Retrieved14 June 2024. Updated 10 November 2021{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: postscript (link)
^Rota, Davide (1999)."English Players in Italy".RSSSF.Archived from the original on 21 September 2007. Retrieved14 June 2024. Updated 11 July 2001.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: postscript (link)
^Chiesa, Carlo (April 2012).La grande storia del calcio italiano (in Italian). p. 18. Published in installments on theGuerin Sportivo.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: postscript (link)
^Giulio Corradino Corradini (7 June 1908)."Federazione acefala".La Stampa Sportiva (in Italian). pp. 10–11.Archived from the original on 29 August 2018. Retrieved21 September 2018.
^Giulio Corradino Corradini (6 September 1908)."Vexata quaestio".La Stampa Sportiva (in Italian). p. 4.Archived from the original on 23 September 2015. Retrieved21 September 2018.
^Chiesa, Carlo (April 2012).La grande storia del calcio italiano (in Italian). pp. 24–25. Published in installments on theGuerin Sportivo.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: postscript (link)
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