€500m from selling young players – why Atalanta are one of Europe’s smartest clubs

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Europa League winners 

Atalanta made history on Wednesday night when Gian Piero Gasperini’s side convincingly thrashed Bayer Leverkusen 3-0 in Dublin, Ireland to win the Europa League. The trophy is the Serie A club’s first major trophy and brought an abrupt end to Leverkusen’s unbeaten run. Going into the game, Xabi Alonso’s side had gone 51 matches without tasting defeat, but were ultimately well beaten by an impressive Atalanta side that had already overcome Sporting, Liverpool and Marseille to reach the final. 

“I am hugely proud for all of Italy because it was a cursed trophy,” said Gasperini’s at full time. “Having won it with Atalanta is perhaps one of those footballing fairytales that rarely crop up. It gives hope for meritocracy. It doesn’t come down to Super Leagues. You can show faith in other teams without big bills and budgets. Let’s try to savour this win before thinking about how far we can go next season. This team has grown with results. We’ve done so while making sure we balance the books or turn a profit and that’s the most exceptional element of this club.”

Indeed, while football fans around the world may have been stunned by Atalanta’s high press and gung-ho tactics against Leverkusen, club owners and chief executives across Europe’s top leagues would have likely been even more impressed by the manner in which the Italian minnows have somehow managed to partner smart business decisions off the pitch with clear success on it. 

How much money have Atalanta made from player sales? 

Over the course of the last five seasons, Atalanta have made a fortune selling young players to bigger clubs in Italy and even directly to some of the Premier League’s richest clubs. Some of these players will be household names to Premier League fans, such as Rasmus Højlund and Cristian Romero, who joined Manchester United and Tottenham respectively for a combined €124 million. Amad Diallo (€21.3m move to Man Utd) and Dejan Kulusevski (€37m move to Juventus) also once called Atalanta home for a while, as well as many other young players. As such, over the course of the last five seasons the Italian club have netted no less than €521m in player sales since the start of the 2019/20 season. Not only is that the eighth highest figure in all of European football, but it’s also the second highest figure for any Italian club. When we then compare that to Atalanta’s spending on player signings in that same period (€370m), it points to a transfer balance of +€152m. Which is the ninth highest return in European football and comfortably the highest profits made from player trading in Italian football. 

Why are Atalanta so good at developing young players? 

Whether it be Diallo, Romero or Højlund, Atalanta have proved time and time again that they know how to put young players on the right path to stardom. “They have a very good youth system, one of the best in Italy and one of the best scouting set ups in the entire world,” said Jatin Dietl, Transfermarkt Serie A expert, when asked why Atalanta always seem to strike gold with young players. “And most of all they’ve been playing a similar style of football for years now, so their scouts and sports director know exactly what kind of characteristics a player has to have for being able to perform at Bergamo. Also, there is a calm ambience and not a lot of pressure which helps the player to grow and evolve in peace.”

Unlike most clubs in the Italian top-flight, Atalanta are one of only two clubs in Serie A that use an Under-23 team in the lower divisions of Italian football. This youth team provides an invaluable opportunity for young players to play senior football at a decent level, which clearly accelerates their development and prepares them well for the Atalanta first team. When we then couple those structural advantages with the fact that the club recently poached Roberto Samaden – considered the best youth academy manager in Italian football – from Inter Milan last summer, it seems clear that players and coaches alike appreciate how much time, effort and money Atalanta put into developing young players. And if their profits from the transfer window are anything to go by, they seem to be doing a fantastic job of it.