Success at the Euros and Olympics has created a feelgood factor but high-profile departures have damaged the league
Italy has never known a sporting summer like it. After Roberto Mancini’s Azzurri delivered on his vow to win Euro 2020, the Olympians followed up with a record 40 medals and 10 golds in Tokyo. Fabio Capello spoke for many: “I have never felt so Italian as I do right now.”
Will the feelgood factor carry over into a new Serie A season? Or has Italy’s top football league been diminished by the departures of too many leading lights? The Internazionale team who ended Juventus’s nine-year reign as champions have since bid farewell to Antonio Conte, Romelu Lukaku and Achraf Hakimi. Their city rivals, Milan, had Gianluigi Donnarumma departing on a free.
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