Wednesday, June 11

Following Tijjani Reijnders's move to Manchester City, Sports Mole looks back at some of the best, and worst, Serie A imports to the Premier League.

The Serie A to Premier League pipeline is one that is not used quite as frequently compared to other top-five leagues, but plenty of players have still made the move over the past three decades, with varying degrees of success.

Another player looking to enjoy success taking that route next season will be new Manchester City midfielder Tijjani Reijnders, who has joined from AC Milan for a fee believed to be in the region of £46.5m.

Premier League clubs have had mixed success when poaching players from the Italian top flight, with some going on to be Hall of Fame-worthy superstars, while others have been discarded in a matter of months.

Here, Sports Mole looks back at the Premier League’s top five Serie A signings, while also making note of some of those who struggled with life in England.

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5: Alisson Becker (Roma to Liverpool, 2018)

After playing against Liverpool in the semi-finals of the Champions League in 2017-18, Alisson was bought by the Reds for a world-record fee of £67m for a goalkeeper, which lasted all of four weeks.

Kepa Arrizabalaga demanded a larger fee from Chelsea, but Alisson’s legacy far outweighs the Spaniard’s, as he has been the best stopper in the Premier League for almost a decade, being one of Liverpool’s most important signings in their recent history.

After a string of underwhelming goalkeepers pulled on the jersey for Liverpool, Alisson’s arrival sparked an era of success that has yielded two Premier League titles, a Champions League, and both of England’s domestic cups, fully paying back the substantial transfer fee the club was willing to pay.

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4: Dennis Bergkamp (Inter Milan to Arsenal, 1995)

Aptly-named the “Non-flying Dutchman” due to his fear of flying, Bergkamp certainly flew high in the estimations of Arsenal supporters during his decade-long stay in North London, after joining for £7.5m from Inter in 1995.

One of the most technically gifted footballers of all time, Bergkamp perfectly encapsulated ‘Total Football’ which was born in his home country of the Netherlands, and that brought him great success with the Gunners.

Scoring 87 goals and providing 94 assists during his spell in the Premier League, Bergkamp was a three-time champion, adding three FA Cups to his honours list too, and earning himself a statue outside the Emirates for the service he gave to the club.

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Dishonourable mentions:

While there have been many success stories for players moving from Serie A, there has been a fair share of failures too, most recently at Manchester United, whose big-money signings of Andre Onana and Rasmus Hojlund have been very costly mistakes, given their bottom-half finish in 2024-25.

No club has blown quite as much money as Chelsea though, who spent near nine-figures to bring Romelu Lukaku back to the club with little effect, joining a lengthy list of Serie A strikers who failed to cut it at Stamford Bridge, including Andriy Shevchenko, Adrian Mutu and Hernan Crespo.

No club has a worse strike rate in the Italian market than West Ham though, who spent big on Gianluca Scamacca, but he had as much impact on the team as previous flops Simone Zaza and Marco Boriello, who thankfully for the Hammers, were only on loan.

As we will soon see, one midfielder moving from Serie A enjoyed unparalleled success in the Premier League, but the same cannot be said for the likes of Juan Sebastian Veron and Alberto Aquilani, who both commanded huge fees, but never showcased the same form they managed in Italy.

Everton are another club who have had very little success in the Italian market, as the failed move for Azzurri international Moise Kean in 2019 shows, and before him, Inter arrival Andy van der Meyde is a name that remains infamous within the fanbase due to his off-field misdemeanours which did not go down well with manager David Moyes, who has been heavily criticised by the Dutchman since his retirement. 

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3: Patrick Vieira (AC Milan to Arsenal, 1996)

Another man immortalised by Arsenal supporters is Vieira, who arrived a year later from Inter’s rivals AC Milan for £3.5m, in one of the biggest bargains in English top-flight history.

Vieira remains one of the greatest players in Arsenal’s history, captaining the side during their invincible title success in 2003-04, during a season which also saw him named in the Premier League Team of the Season for a sixth time in a row.

A complete midfielder who was capable of scoring important goals, creating chances, being a destroyer in the engine room, running the game in possession and showcasing excellent leadership, Vieira won three titles and four FA Cups with Arsenal before returning to Italy to sign for Juventus.

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2: Mohamed Salah (Roma to Liverpool, 2017)

A year before Liverpool signed Alisson from the Giallorossi, they struck a deal to bring Egyptian winger Salah to the club, with some reservations, given his underwhelming spell at Chelsea a few years earlier.

Salah put those doubts to bed in emphatic fashion, scoring 44 goals in his first season with the club - his highest tally in one campaign - and he has gone on to claim legend status at Anfield.

The £36m spent on Salah is a snip when taking into consideration what he has offered the club, sitting third in the all-time scorers list with 245 goals in 401 appearances, with 186 coming in the Premier League, making him the highest non-English scorer in the competition’s history - a league he has won twice.

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Honourable mentions:

Selecting just five players for this list was challenging, so it is important to give a mention to some of the other Serie A imports that have had a big impact on the English game.

Chelsea have been far and away the most busy English club in the Italian market, and none had a bigger impact than Gianfranco Zola, who arrived in 1996, the same year fellow countrymen Gianluca Vialli and Roberto Di Matteo moved to Stamford Bridge.

Zola played over 300 games for Chelsea, and eventually became assistant at the club alongside Maurizio Sarri, while Vialli was briefly the manager, replacing Ruud Gullit, another import from Serie A to the Blues later in his playing career, and nobody will forget Di Matteo leading Chelsea to their first ever Champions League title in 2012.

Edwin van der Sar is another who deserves respect, joining Fulham from Juve in 2001, and spending a decade in English football, most notably being part of the hugely successful Manchester United team in the late-2000s that won three straight titles, and the Champions League in 2008.

At a slightly lower level, Newcastle United have also had joy shopping in Serie A, because despite not having a huge impact over his two years at the club, Faustino Asprilla joined from Parma and went on to score a famous hat trick against Barcelona, while Sandro Tonali has become one of the finest midfielders in the Premier League over the past year after moving from Milan.

While there were plenty of things to criticise about Mario Balotelli, he was also impossible to hate, becoming one of the modern-day characters in the Premier League, and he will forever go down in folklore for setting up the very famous Sergio Aguero goal that won Man City their first Premier League title.

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1: Thierry Henry (Juventus to Arsenal, 1999)

Some eyebrows were raised when Arsene Wenger brought Henry to Highbury after a brief, failed spell at Juventus, but the Frenchman paid back the £11m fee instantly, scoring 26 goals in his debut campaign, before going from strength to strength.

Often regarded as the league’s greatest foreign import, Henry scored 226 times in just eight years with Arsenal, winning two league titles and three FA Cups, while also putting together the season of his life in 2003-04.

As Arsenal became just the second club in English football history to go unbeaten across a league season, Henry won the European Golden Shoe that year with 30 goals, sweeping the individual domestic accolades, while also finishing second in the FIFA World Player of the Year award, just after coming second in the 2003 Ballon d’Or vote.

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