Italian Seria A - 20. 08. 2016

Seria A is a professional league competition for football clubs located at the top of the Italian football league system. Seria A has produced the highest number of European Cup finalists. Italian clubs have reached the final of the competition on a record 27 different occasions, winning the title 12 times.

Serie A is ranked fourth among European leagues according to UEFA's league coefficient, behind La Liga, Bundesliga and Premier League. The competitionled the UEFA ranking from 1986 to 1988 and from 1990 to 1999. Serie A was known as the best football league in the world in 1990´s. Competition comprises of 20 teams. First two teams of the table qualifies straight to Champions League, 3 teams with the least amount of points are relegated to Serie B.

The first Italian football team was Genoa CFC, founded in 1893. In 1898 was found football league comprised of 4 clubs. Seria A in current form was found in 1929.

The most successful team is Juventus with 25 league wins. Internazionale and Milan won league both 18 times. Best all-time scorer is Silvio Piola with 274 goals in 537 matches. Francesco Totti is second (249/598), third is Gunnar Nordahl (225/291). Paolo Maldini made the most appearances (647), followed by Javier Zanetti (615) and Francesco Totti (601).

Juventus and other 5 clubs were involved in big corruption affair in 2006. Juventus lost their 2004/05 and 2005/06 titles and was relegated to Serie B. Other teams lost some points and were expelled from European Cups. Juventus was after one season in Serie B promoted and in seasons 2011/12 – 2015/16 won league title 5 times in a row. Internazionale won league 5 times in row in years 2005/06 – 2009/10.

Juventus, Milan and Internazionale are members of the G-14, a group which represented the largest and most prestigious European football clubs. Serie A is the only league to produce three founding members.