With several big stories in Serie A this summer, we asked James Horncastle to survey the state of Italian football heading into 2016-17.
Pogboom? No, ZZ Top
For the second time this century, Juventus have commanded a world-record transfer fee for one of their players. While it was Zinedine Zidane in 2001, see his fellow Frenchman Paul Pogba in 2016. The transfer deal with Manchester United amounts to €110 million including add-on, but Juve will not receive it in its entirety. As was revealed in their statement announcing Pogba's sale on Tuesday, "the economic effect is positive for about €72.6m, net of solidarity subsidy and auxiliary expenses."
A cause of great speculation is just what has happened to the other €32.4m and how much has ended up in the pocket of Pogba's agent, Mino Raiola. For the latter, the papers in Italy insist as much as €25m. Today's Gazzetta dello Sport also claims United will pay Raiola an additional €10m in commission. We won't get a better idea of Juventus' side of things until their next set of accounts are published.
Make no mistake -- it's still a huge profit on a player they picked up practically for nothing four years ago, but it doesn't look quite as good as expected. In fact, as Marco Iaria has found, the fee Real Madrid paid for Zidane in '01, when adjusted for inflation, is worth €95m in today's money, €89m in profit. Historically speaking, it still remains the best business Juventus have done.
Inter's "I-Kia" catalogue business
On Wednesday morning, Inter trained in Iesi, Roberto Mancini's hometown. That must have been awkward. Dismissed from his head-coaching job at Inter on Monday, less than a fortnight before the beginning of the season, he had a year left on his contract and turned down an extension when it became clear he would have less of a say about who Inter signed and would be entitled to less if Inter decided to part company with him early.
Much intrigue, however, surrounds agent Kia Joorabchian. He is an advisor to Inter's new owners, Suning. He was involved as an intermediary in the deals that took Alex Teixeira, Ramires and Jo to Suning's Chinese Super League club Jiangsu in January. How, you ask, might all this have impacted Mancini? Well, you may recall the circumstances by which Mancini replaced Joorabchian's client, Mark Hughes, at Manchester City and how Mancini fell out with Carlos Tevez, also one of Joorabchian's clients.
It just so happens that Inter's new coach, Frank de Boer, comes represented by Joorabchian too, and interest in midfielder Joao Mario -- hazard a guess at who his agent is? -- has returned since Mancini's departure. When it comes to the interior design of their football clubs, Suning appear to like the "I-Kia" catalogue.
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