When I watch Serie A today, I feel a sense of both nostalgia and concern. I know that the league was once viewed as the undisputed home of the world’s greatest talent, a place where tactical mastery and individual brilliance coexisted. Now, Serie A feels like a league trapped between its glorious past and a high-intensity European present it struggles to match.
The 2025/26 season epitomizes this decline. For the first time in the modern era, no Italian club secured a direct spot in the UEFA Champions League Round of 16. That is not just a statistical anomaly, it is a symptom of systemic decay. Serie A still carries cultural weight, but in practical terms, it resembles a distressed asset, a league with historical prestige but underperforming structurally, financially, and tactically.
I want to explore how we arrived here, why this decline matters, and why change is urgent if Italian football is to reclaim any form of European relevance. Serie A’s decline is stark when contrasted with its golden age. Fans who are old enough remember what football in Italy used to be: from the late 1980s to the early 2000s, the league functioned like a mini World Cup every weekend. Matches mattered, not just domestically but across the continent. Clubs like Juventus, AC Milan, Inter Milan, Roma, Lazio, Fiorentina, and Parma, the so-called “Seven Sisters”, competed for the Scudetto simultaneously. It was rare to see one club dominate entirely, and this parity kept the league highly competitive.
European competitions were dominated by these teams. The 1989/90 season especially stood out, Milan won the European Cup, Sampdoria triumphed in the Cup Winners’ Cup, and Juventus lifted the UEFA Cup, beating another Italian team(Fiorentina) by the way. Across the 1990s, Serie A contested 13 European finals. Italian clubs were feared and respected, their tactical intelligence setting the standard globally.
Comparing that to today is painful. Back then, Italy was the gravitational center of football; now, it struggles even to advance past the group stages of European competitions. If you watch Serie A games today, the stadiums often feel like relics. Many of Italy’s venues were built decades ago and remain municipally owned, which restricts revenue potential and modernization. Roughly 90% of stadiums are not privately controlled, unlike England or Germany, where clubs invested heavily in arenas that double as commercial hubs.
The San Siro is emblematic. A stadium that has hosted countless finals and legendary matches cannot secure redevelopment, with a new stadium projected only in 2031. Milan even lost the right to host the 2027 UCL final, a humiliation for a venue of its history.
Smaller clubs struggle even more. Fiorentina’s Stadio Artemio Franchi redevelopment has been delayed repeatedly due to a €60 million funding gap. I cannot overstate the impact: when clubs cannot modernize their stadiums, they lose matchday income, global marketing opportunities, and the ability to attract elite talent. Infrastructure stagnation has become a visible symptom of systemic failure in Italian football governance.
Financial instability is the backbone of Serie A’s decline, and I cannot stress this enough. Looking at broadcast deals alone reveals the scale of the problem: the Premier League earns roughly €1.58 billion from international television rights, La Liga around €1.1 billion, the Bundesliga €850 million, and Ligue 1 €540 million. Serie A earns just €371 million. That is not a marginal gap—it is a structural handicap that defines every club’s competitive potential.
I see this most clearly when examining squad-building. Even top clubs cannot consistently match English or Spanish teams in wages. For instance, Inter Milan’s average squad wage in 2025/26 is around €58 million, compared to Manchester City’s €260 million or Real Madrid’s €210 million. That disparity affects recruitment: Italian teams struggle to lure elite attackers in their prime. They are forced to rely on aging veterans or players coming off inconsistent seasons elsewhere.
Financial Fair Play adds another layer. Many commentators treat FFP as a restriction, but for Serie A, it is a stress test that exposes weakness. Clubs with limited revenue cannot comply while aggressively pursuing European success, creating a cycle where ambition is curtailed by necessity. I’ve observed clubs making trades and transfers not because they optimize performance, but to satisfy accounting rules. The consequence is clear: a product on the pitch that is conservative, risk-averse, and less attractive to a global audience.
Even temporary mechanisms like the Growth Decree, which allowed clubs to sign high-wage foreign talent, were insufficient long-term fixes. Its repeal in 2024 revealed just how dependent Serie A had become on artificial levers to remain competitive. Without substantial increases in revenue from broadcasting, sponsorship, or matchday income, the league will remain financially constrained, and FFP will continue to reinforce these limitations rather than balance them.
One of the most visible symptoms of Serie A’s decline is its reliance on aging stars. Watching the 2025/26 season, one can see it clearly: at Cremonese, 38-year-old Jamie Vardy continues to be one of the most decisive attacking players, while at Milan, 39-year-old Luka Modrić remains a central figure in midfield. I do not begrudge these players, their longevity, their professionalism and intelligence are undeniable, but the league’s dependence on such veterans reflects deeper structural problems.
