Atalanta!The game’s biggest overachievers dismantle supposedly unbeatable Bayer Leverkusen to finally claim the trophy they so richly deserved

Gian Piero Gasperini had never won a trophy as a coach. Atalanta hadn’t lifted one for 61 years. And they’d only lost another consecutive Coppa Italia final (their third under Gasperini) just last week. So, what chance did they have against Bayer Leverkusen, the newly crowned, treble-chasing Bundesliga champions who hadn’t lost for 361 days? Zero, according to many pundits.

Indeed, some even feared that Gasperini was bracing himself for defeat by arguing that the result of the Europa League final was irrelevant; that Atalanta’s mere presence in Dublin was a kind of victory in and of itself. He was right, too.

Even if they’d lost, Atalanta’s achievements under Gasperini would still have warranted the utmost respect. The thing is, though, had they not completely dismantled Xabi Alonso’s supposedly unstoppable side, they might not have got it.

Because Atalanta have been defying logic for a long time, and only now will they get the credit they so richly deserve after finally getting their hands on the trophy they have well and truly earned.

Annual aim? Beat the drop

When Antonio Percassi acquired Atalanta in 2010, they were a Serie B side beset by problems on and off the field. The first objective was to get back into Italy’s top flight; the second was to stay there. Even now, Percassi says that the aim at the start of every season is to avoid relegation – and it’s easy to understand why.

Atalanta are a provincial Italian club, their ground holds just 15,000 people and their annual revenue, a significant chunk of which is generated by player sales, is usually around €200 million. This is not a club that has featured in the top 20 of Deloitte’s Football Money League yet they have just qualified for the Champions League for the third time in five years, while at the same time reaching their first-ever European final – and then winning it.

Perhaps even more impressively, they have done all of this while playing fantastic football.

‘I like your ideas’

Ahead of Atalanta’s crunch clash with Crotone on October 2, 2016, the newly-appointed Gasperini was stopped by a man outside his home in Bergamo. After four defeats in his first five Serie A games in charge, the Piemontese naturally feared a dressing-down from an upset local.

However, the stranger told him, “I like your ideas. I’m convinced you will do well here.” As Gasperini later admitted in an interview with the Gazzetta dello Sport, “I thought he was making fun of me.”

That Monday, Atalanta claimed a pivotal 3-1 victory at Crotone that Gasperini admits saved his job. It also earned him a free meal. “I met that man again and he invited me to dinner at his house,” Gasperini revealed. “He cooked a great risotto. Today, Paolo is a great friend.”

The continued support of the fans and the Percassi family obviously played a pivotal role in Gasperini’s subsequent success – but so too did his continued faith in himself, and his footballing philosophy.

Humble but ambitious

Gasperini freely admits that for a decade of his coaching career “retaining numerical superiority in defence was a dogma”. However, ahead of a game against Juventus during his second stint at Genoa between 2013 and 2016, he had something of an epiphany.

Although determined to stick with his favoured 3-4-3 formation, he decided to go one-v-one at the back when in possession, thus gaining “a spare man that I could commit to tactical manoeuvres.”

“It was worth the risk,” he subsequently explained to the Gazzetta. “The Atalanta defenders you see attacking constantly today were born of that intuition.”

Such an adventurous approach has been punished at times, particularly by teams boasting bigger budgets and, thus, better players. “Every time we conceded five goals, I thought about potentially playing in a different way,” he recently admitted. “But me and my assistant Tullio Gritti – we’re stubborn. This season we have managed to have a great run and also continue with our identity.”

Indeed, they’d already secured their participation in next season’s Champions League via a guaranteed top-five finish in Serie A, while at the same reaching the final of the Coppa Italia, where they were beaten by Juventus.

It’s a remarkable achievement for a club with a wage bill of just over €29m (for context, Juve’s is €74.1m). For Gasperini, this season just provides more evidence that it is possible for the smaller sides to not only beat the big boys, but to do so by taking the game to them, just as they did in Dublin.

“Just because you’re humble, doesn’t mean you can’t be ambitious,” he argued. “I firmly believe you are more likely to get good results if you play good football.”

However, as Gasperini and others have been at pains to point out, Atalanta’s remarkable rise to prominence just wouldn’t have been possible without the Percassi family. “Behind teams that play well and express themselves like Atalanta, there is always great ownership,” former Italy coach Cesare Prandelli told the Gazzetta. “The solidity and mentality of the owners have done a lot for the club. Gian Piero deserves a statue in Bergamo. Together with the Percassi family.”

Europe’s best-run club

Percassi, Atalanta’s patron, is a wealthy man. He made a small fortune working with Benetton and investing in the make-up industry. However, the former defender, who was forced to quit the game at the age of 24, does not have pockets deep enough to buy even the best players in Italy. There is, then, no other option for Percassi to be prudent.

As he once told Sky Sport Italia, “Keeping the books balanced is fundamental for us” – and there is no better-run club in Italy, and maybe even in Europe.

They have managed to turn a profit for years in a row, while at the same acquiring their stadium from the local municipality (making them one of only five Serie A teams to own their home ground) – and then modernising it to meet UEFA standards. When the final phase of the redevelopment is completed before the start of next season, the capacity will have jumped to 25,000.

“It’s been the biggest investment in the history of Atalanta, but we are very proud, as Atalanta and the people of Bergamo deserve a stadium of this quality,” Luca Percassi told Sky. “Being able to see the walls of the city from the stands is truly meaningful, it is a home for the team and its fans.”

So, how have Atalanta managed to achieve all of this? By identifying and developing players like no other team in Italy.

‘The turning point’

During his first spell as club president between 1990 and 1994, Percassi hired Como’s Fermo Favini with a view to creating a breeding ground for top talent. As of today, Atalanta’s academy is the most productive in Serie A – and Gasperini has made the absolute most of the gold mine he had the good fortune to find in Bergamo.

“[Eight years ago], there were lots of players in the youth ranks, close to the first team, but they were hardly involved,” he told UEFA’s official website. “That was the turning point – from then on, Atalanta’s world changed a bit.”

Indeed, Atalanta became one of the best teams in Europe by putting academy graduates such as Franck Kessie, Andrea Conti, Roberto Gagliardini, Mattia Caldara and Alessandro Bastoni in the first team before selling them at an enormous profit. Massive money was also made on youth-team stars who barely featured for the senior squad, including Dejan Kulusevski and Amad Diallo.

Then there’s the likes of Rasmus Hojlund, who was signed from Sturm Graz for €17m (£14.5m/$18.5m) in August 2022 and sold to Manchester United the following summer for more than four times that fee – the perfect illustration of an incredible scouting and recruitment team put in place by former technical director Giovanni Sartori.

Best pound-for-pound team in the world

Atalanta’s Europa League triumph, then, is a shining example of what can be achieved when every single person at a club is working towards a common goal. “Ideas, management skills and a sense of belonging are the key,” Gasperini told UEFA on the eve of the final. “We have already proved that even in a small environment and with numbers that are not extraordinary, it is still possible to create a team that is entirely identified with the local area… Perhaps our extraordinary journey will be better evaluated in a few years.”

It’s happening now, though. Wednesday’s win is a game-changer for Gasperini and Atalanta. Their victory – and the nature of their performance – has focused the attention of the entire football world on Bergamo, meaning Atalanta should finally be recognised as the biggest overachievers in Europe for more than five years.

No other coach – not Pep Guardiola, not Carlo Ancelotti and not even Jurgen Klopp – has done anything that compares to the work done by Gasperini at Atalanta. You’d have to go all the way back to Sir Alex Ferguson at Aberdeen or Guy Roux at Auxerre to see something similar. Atalanta are, quite simply, the best pound-for-pound team on the planet.

“You don’t always manage to win trophies,” Gasperini told Sky in April, after watching Atalanta to become the first Italian team to win twice at Anfield, “but when you can make history for a club like ours, that is worth a lot too.” In an era of football utterly ruined by money, such a story is actually priceless and now it has the happy ending – and the silverware – it always merited.