Leonardo Bonucci’s move from Juventus to Milan is big news but nothing new. Dino Zoff, Paolo Rossi, Roberto Baggio and Gabriel Batistuta all paved the way

In a transfer window brimming with narratives, Leonardo Bonucci’s move from Juventus to Milan is undoubtedly the biggest story in Serie A. His decision to leave Turin has rocked Italian football and not just because it came as Milan’s new owners set off on a spending spree designed to make the club title contenders once more. Bonucci’s move was utterly unexpected, swiftly completed and left fans on both sides of the divide incredulous, albeit for different reasons.

Milan’s new captain is not the only player to have made a contentious move this summer, with Federico Bernardeschi’s £35m transfer from Fiorentina to Juventus also provoking indignation from fans. Fans in Serie A should really be prepared for unlikely deals by now – Bonucci and Bernardeschi are just the latest in a long line of players to have created a stir by swapping one Italian club for another.

Renzo de Vecchi: Milan to Genoa, 1913

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Known as the “Son of God” for his precocious talent, Renzo de Vecchi became a household name in Italy when he completed his move to Genoa in 1913. De Vecchi was a bank clerk by trade and a prodigious left-back on weekends and Genoa considered him the missing piece of the jigsaw as they looked to break Pro Vercelli’s hegemony.

But, with the Italian game still in its infancy, footballers found guilty of professionalism – which would only be recognised officially with the implementation of the Viareggio Charter in 1926 – were dealt with harshly by the Italian football association.

Genoa, however, were not to be denied their man. De Vecchi left his job in Milan and became “employed” by a Genoese bank, which agreed to pay him a salary way above average. His 24,000 lire transfer fee, and other elements of his pay, were instead hidden as “travel expenses”.

Dino Zoff: Mantova to Napoli, 1967

Facebook Twitter Pinterest Dino Zoff saves a shot from Pelé at the World Cup. Photograph: Anonymous/AP

Dino Zoff is best remembered for lifting the 1982 World Cup and winning almost everything there was to win with Juventus, but his move from Mantova to Napoli in 1967 has also gone down in folklore.

The 25-year-old had looked all but certain to sign for either Milan or Inter throughout the summer, but the last day of the transfer window came and went and Zoff remained a Mantova player. However, shortly after midnight – the deadline for transfers in Serie A – it emerged that Napoli had pipped both Milanese rivals to the post and secured the goalkeeper for 120m lire.

How they did so, however, remains open to debate. Some suggest Napoli’s president Gioacchino Lauro pulled off a masterstroke by monitoring the moves of Milan and Inter before outbidding them both. Others claim that Napoli manager Bruno Pesaola persuaded journalist Alberto Giovannini to pass himself off as the Napoli president and make a bid. Once the bid was accepted and the transfer window had closed, the president was informed and he couldn’t refuse.

Zoff ended up playing 143 league games for Napoli, featuring in every Serie A match the team played during his stint at the feet of Mount Vesuvius, before joining Juventus in 1972.

Giuseppe Savoldi: Bologna to Napoli, 1975

Trevor Francis can claim to have been the first £1m player in British football – or £999,999, according to Brian Clough – but Giuseppe Savoldi had broken the barrier four years earlier, as he left Bologna for Napoli.

The club invested 2bn lire (£1.2m at the time) on the striker, who had scored 140 goals in all competitions during his seven seasons with Bologna and had inspired the club to two Coppa Italia triumphs in 1970 and 1974.

The move down the Autosole (Sun Motorway) – as Italians call the motorway that connects Milan to Naples via Bologna – caused a major stir and not just because it made Savoldi the most expensive player in the world, breaking a record previously held by Johan Cruyff following his move to Barcelona from Ajax for £922,000 two years earlier.

For Napoli, who had finished third and runners-up in their previous two seasons, Savoldi was supposed to be the missing piece in the jigsaw, but during his four years at the San Paolo, the club never finished higher than fifth.

Paolo Rossi: Vicenza/Juventus to Vicenza, 1978

Facebook Twitter Pinterest Paolo Rossi in action for Italy at the 1982 World Cup. Photograph: Bob Thomas/Getty Images

Having scored 21 goals to drag Vicenza into the top flight in the 1976-77 season, Paolo Rossi scored another 24 times in the following campaign as the provincial side defied expectations and finished second in Serie A. Rossi’s performances earned him a call-up to the 1978 World Cup squad and put Vicenza and Juventus, who both owned 50% of the player, at loggerheads.

With the two parties unable to reach an agreement, Rossi’s destiny was to be decided by a “game of envelopes” – a surprisingly common scenario in Italian football – where both clubs would put a figure in an envelope and the club with the highest bid would win.

Vicenza lacked Juventus’ financial clout and were expected to lose out on the player, but only for the club’s president Giuseppe Farina – who would later take charge of Milan – to bid 2.61bn lire (£1.75m at the time).

The fee, which was far more than Juventus had expected, made Rossi the most expensive player in the world, but Farina had overstretched himself and Vicenza went down the following season. Rossi moved to Perugia, where he became embroiled in a betting scandal that saw him banned for two years, before eventually joining Juventus in time to be selected for the 1982 World Cup where his six goals would help Italy become champions.

Agostino di Bartolomei: Roma to Milan, 1984

In May 1984, Agostino di Bartolomei came within 12 yards of captaining Roma to their first European Cup triumph, only for the Giallorossi to be denied on home soil as Liverpool won on penalties. A few months later, Di Bartolomei left his hometown side after 15 seasons and moved north to Milan in one of Serie A’s most bitter transfers.

“Why am I leaving? I don’t know,” he said, as he acrimoniously parted ways with the side he had steered to the Serie A title in the 1982-83 season. In his first game against his former side, Di Bartolomei – who took his own life in 1994, on the 10th anniversary of Roma’s defeat to Liverpool – celebrated wildly after scoring the opener, ensuring there would be no welcome party waiting at the Stadio Olimpico. His first return to Rome almost descended in a riot, after he was assaulted by Francesco Graziani in retribution for a horrendous challenge on Bruno Conti.

Ultimately, Di Bartolomei never hit the heights in Milan he had experienced in Rome. The Rossoneri didn’t challenge for the Serie A title during his three seasons at the club and only reached the Coppa Italia final once, in 1985, which they lost to Sampdoria thanks to goals from Graeme Souness, Roberto Mancini and Gianluca Vialli.

Roberto Baggio: Fiorentina to Juventus, 1990

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There are transfers that are controversial and transfers that almost incite urban riots. Roberto Baggio’s move from Fiorentina to Juventus falls into the latter category, as the streets of Florence erupted with rage.

The Divine Ponytail became the world’s most expensive player when Juventus signed him for £8m in the summer of 1990, while Fiorentina’s president Flavio Pontello was reportedly forced to take shelter inside the Artemio Franchi Stadium for two days after the transfer was announced as fans laid siege to the club’s headquarters. Nine arrests were made and 50 people were left injured, as disgruntled fans pelted their team’s headquarters with a barrage of bricks and Molotov cocktails. Baggio had become an icon for Viola fans during five seasons in Florence and Pontello’s decision to sell him to hated rivals Juventus smacked of betrayal.

On his first return to the Franchi, Baggio was met by a cacophony of boos and jeers. He declined to take a penalty and, when he was substituted, he picked up a Fiorentina scarf that had been tossed towards him as he walked off the pitch. The gesture only succeeded in antagonising Juventus fans, who never really warmed to Baggio. Some 27 years since that summer, Federico Bernardeschi has just followed the same route.

Christian Vieri: Lazio to Inter, 1999

One of the most devastating strikers Serie A has ever seen, Christian Vieri was never one for settling. In the summer of 1999, Inter became his ninth club, as they paid Lazio a world record 90bn lire (69bn lire plus Diego Simeone) for his services. Vieri, who had missed three months of his only season at Lazio due to a serious knee injury, would join Ronaldo in what promised to be the most potent strike force in the world.

“He’s as arrogant as they come,” thundered Lazio president Sergio Cragnotti, who had bought Vieri from Atlético Madrid only 12 months earlier. “We don’t want to sell him, but he wants to leave and I can’t keep someone like him at the club.”

Ultimately, however, the Lazio chairman would have the last laugh. Vieri scored 103 goals in 144 Serie A games for Inter but the dream partnership with Ronaldo never materialised, as the Brazilian was struck down by a series of serious injuries. Lazio won the title in Vieri’s first season in Milan and stopped Inter from winning it in 2002, when they beat them 4-2 in the last game of the season to hand Juve the title.

Gabriel Batistuta: Fiorentina to Roma, 2000

Facebook Twitter Pinterest Gabriel Batistuta in action for Roma. Photograph: Reuters

“One title with this club is worth more than 10 with Milan or Juventus,” said Gabriel Batistuta when asked about his reluctance to leave Fiorentina. Few footballers have embodied a club and connected with fans as much as Batigol did in Florence. However, at 31, he finally allowed his head to rule over his heart and moved to Rome looking for that Serie A title that had proved so elusive in Florence.

If Batistuta was keen to move to the capital, Roma were ready to welcome him with open arms. Still smarting from seeing Lazio clinch the Scudetto the previous season, they parted way with £23.5m for the Argentinian, still a world record fee for a player in his thirties. The investment paid off handsomely, as Batistuta’s 20 goals in 28 Serie A appearances drove Roma to their first title in 28 years.

Zlatan Ibrahimovic: Juventus to Inter, 2006

Facebook Twitter Pinterest Zlatan Ibrahimovic in action for Inter. Photograph: Giuseppe Cacace/AFP/Getty Images

The summer of 2006 was a tumultuous time in Italian football. Italy won their fourth World Cup in Germany while fans at home digested the effects of the Calciopoli scandal. Juventus were relegated to Serie B and stripped of the league titles they had won in the previous two seasons, while Lazio, Fiorentina, Milan and Reggina were hit by heavy penalties.

Inter, on the other hand, were the big winners. In almost unprecedented circumstances, they were given the opportunity to strengthen their side, while simultaneously weaken one of their main rivals. While Gigi Buffon, Alessandro Del Piero, Pavel Nedved and David Trezeguet opted to remain in Turin, Zlatan Ibrahimovic and Patrick Vieira chose an immediate return to Serie A and moved to Inter, while Fabio Cannavaro joined Real Madrid.

The Swede, in particular, became public enemy No1 after completing his €24.8m to one of Juve’s main rivals, with Juventus fans accusing him of being a mercenary. In customary fashion, Ibrahimovic was unfazed by the criticism and went on to score 57 league goals in his three seasons at Inter, winning three consecutive league titles.

Gonzalo Higuaín: Napoli to Juventus, 2016

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In April 1975, with Napoli two points behind Juventus in the title race, José Altafini came off the bench to score an 88th-minute winner against his former side, earning himself the nickname “Core ‘Ngrato”, which means “ungrateful heart” in Neapolitan dialect.

Altafini’s move from Napoli to Juventus had hurt, but Gonzalo Higuaín’s journey along the same path 46 years later was a lot harder to stomach. Altafini’ had spent seven seasons at the Stadio San Paolo and was 34 when he moved to Turin, while Higuaín was 28 years old and in the prime of his career. In his last season in Naples he had just scored 36 goals in 35 Serie A games, surpassing Gunnar Nordhal’s record, which had stood for 66 years.

A few months later, Juventus triggered Higuaín’s €90m release clause, making him the most expensive player in the history of Italian football and the third most expensive player of all time. Napoli fans, who had hoped the Argentinian striker would follow Diego Maradona’s example and guide the club to their first Scudetto since 1990, had to endure the pain of Higuaín scoring the winner in his first appearance against his former side. To make matters worse, Higuaín won the double at reached the Champions League final in his first season at Juventus. Napoli won nothing.

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