History of American Presidents in Italian football

After various indiscretions yesterday came the confirmation that Atalanta was sold by the Percassi family to Steve Pagliuca, the co-owner of the Boston Celtics and vice-chairman of the investment fund Bain Capital. Atalanta is only the latest Italian team to pass under a U.S. presidency, following a trend that is clearly visible in the other major European leagues. After having saturated every space in the Premier League, North American investors have turned towards our championship, full of tradition and passion and available at lower prices than in England. 

The first was James Pallotta, who in 2012 bought A.S. Roma from Franco Sensi,  transforming it into the first stars and stripes team in Serie A. A presidency that did not go exactly according to the plans and he in the summer of 2020 sold the Giallorossi team to his compatriot Dan Friedkin, without a trophy in his trophy cabinet and many regrets. 

After an initial period under Di Benedetto, Pallotta's Roma invested heavily in the international profile of the Giallorossi, with foreign tours and very active social profiles on the model of those of U.S. teams. But the club, despite a very competitive roster, never managed to win a full result, reaching at most a Champions League semifinal and, above all, not building the Tor di Valle stadium that was to be the center of the new Roma of the American president. A failure that also sanctioned the end of the Pallotta experience, but not of the Americans in Rome, as the Friedkin's are now retracing the same steps. 

Pallotta's arrival in Italy, however, had the merit of opening Serie A to new markets, showing to foreign investors how it was possible to enter one of the most important leagues in the world without necessarily spending the astronomical sums of money the Premier League required. In the last decade, in fact, more and more presidencies have changed flag, such as Milan, Venice, Bologna, Spezia, Fiorentina, Genoa and most recently Atalanta, moving from the tricolor to the stars & stripes.

The Rossoneri switched in 2018 to the Elliot Fund following the default of obligations to the U.S. investment fund by Li Yonghong, who had initially borrowed 303 million dollars from the fund to buy Milan from Fininvest. In the last three years, the company founded by Paul Singer has invested more than 700 million dollars in the Milanese team, finally returning to the Champions League but at the same time making bloody sacrifices, first of which was letting Gigio Donnarumma walk away for free. 

Bologna was the second Italian team to have North American ownership, this time linked to investors represented by Canadian businessman Joey Saputo, in 2014. The architect of this operation, Italian-American Joe Tacopina, also former president of Venezia, is now in charge of Spal. While Fiorentina has gone from the velvety elegance of Della Valle to the veracious explosiveness of Rocco Commisso, who has distinguished himself for his unfiltered declarations on the Artemio Franchi stadium, defined as a "lousy stadium", and on Juventus, guilty of having too much power in Italy. 

Since the Americans landed in Venice in 2015, however, the lagoon club has relaunched in grand style, conquering the top flight after two decades and creating a recognizable profile off the field. Since a year the president is Duncan Niederauer, who heads the company VFC Newco 2020 LLC. Spezia similarly is another small town that, thanks to the wise guidance of Gabriele Volpi, has gone from LegaPro to Serie A in ten years. Last year it was sold to American financier Robert Platek, who has big plans for the company. Another Ligurian team, Genoa, on the other hand, finally came out of the long Preziosi presidency and went to the US holding company 777 Partners headed by virologist Alberto Zangrillo. 

But American capital does not only look at Serie A but also at the cadet categories, seeing that in recent years Como, Padova, Parma, Pisa, Pistoiese, Spal and Triestina have now flown the American flag. A situation that is creating a bitter sweet feeling in the fans, because if on one hand an American presidency means great ambitions and new investments, on the other hand it certifies the estrangement of the property from the city community and from the bangs of organized supporters. The arrival of the American presidents, at the head of a group of companies and investment funds that no one really knows how concrete they are, has effectively ended the season of the owner-presidents that, for better or worse, has characterized the most luminous phase of Italian soccer.