From playgrounds to the presidency of Inter, the football parable of Beppe Marotta

Without the intelligence of humility, some fortunate results can be gained, but the memory is not fixed, an exemplary path is not outlined. That path which, after debuts in Varese, Monza, Como and Ravenna, led Marotta to Venice in the second half of the 1990s. It was at that time, perhaps, that a certain Calcio took notice of him. Under his care and with Walter Novellino on the bench, the lagoon team was promoted to the highest tricolour championship. And from 2000 to 2002 Marotta then took over as general manager of Atalanta. The turning point in his career, however, came with his move to Sampdoria in May 2002. In Genoa he was called by Riccardo Garrone, head of the energy giant Erg, who had saved the club from bankruptcy earlier that year. Marotta not only brought Samp back to Serie A, but also made it a solid club, capable of planning and at the same time inventing 'risky' moves such as signing the bizarre talent Antonio Cassano, back from the dark years in Madrid, and a centre forward in search of revenge like Giampaolo Pazzini. A pair that dragged the team into the Champions League in 2010.

It was then that another club, Juventus, going through a decidedly negative phase, still embroiled in the miasma of Calciopoli, decided to turn to Marotta. These were the years of consecration. Together with president Andrea Agnelli, Pavel Nedved and sporting director Fabio Paratici, the new Juventus manager started the reconstruction. Players like Andrea Pirlo, Arturo Vidal, Paul Pogba, Carlos Tevez, Paulo Dybala and Gonzalo Higuain arrived to strengthen the squad. After almost a decade, Juve put a Scudetto in their trophy cabinet and won five more in a row, grinding out records for points and unbeaten streak.

'The most exciting victory,' says Marotta, 'remains winning the first title in Trieste, where the match against Cagliari was played on a neutral pitch. I crowned a dream. My professional dream. But it was even more exciting because that Scudetto was the first of the new management and of Antonio Conte as coach. After the seventh place of the previous season, our common imperative was to bring Juve back. And we succeeded.

The Italian champion club thus returned to the European stage, reaching the Champions League final twice in three seasons, but failed to lift the 'cup with big ears'. "There, the final lost in Cardiff against Real Madrid was the biggest disappointment of this period," Marotta regretted at the time. "But I always keep in mind a phrase by Nelson Mandela who says 'I never lose: either I win or I learn'. And from that experience we learnt a few things. Let's call it the know-how it takes to achieve certain trophies. A mix of experience and the ability to be lucid at the top moments. So for us the challenge starts again. We are even more determined.

In those years, a resounding turnaround also took place for Juve in terms of accounts. A portentous turnaround for a 'special' company, as football companies are, which went from a deficit of 95 million in 2011 to a surplus of 4 million in 2016, with a doubling of turnover from 172 to 388 million. All this in a regime of substantial 'autarky'. after the 120 million injected by the shareholders at the beginning of the new cycle. Performance that led the FIGC to inscribe Beppe Marotta's name in the Hall of Fame of Italian football.

An award also for his management philosophy. Marotta is not a centraliser. At the top of the chain of command, he prefers to surround himself with men and women of great quality (not yesmen, mind you), delegating and empowering each collaborator. 'Juventus,' he proudly recounted, 'is a company with over 500 employees that aspires to consolidate itself as one of the most important and profitable multinationals in the SportSystem. I therefore think that everyone must be put in a position to give their best and contribute to the collective success. The same philosophy must permeate the team of players and the technical staff, as well as the different sectors of the Juventus industry. And the same trust must underpin the relationship with the owners'.

A strong and potentially unwieldy ownership such as that of Exor, chairman John Elkann and the Agnelli family. 'With whom it is essential to dialogue, while respecting roles. It is necessary to know how to maintain the right distances, with balance and a sense of responsibility'. An almost Calvinist spirit that went well with the status of transnational big company of the new Fiat-Chrysler, translating into the need/opportunity to achieve economic self-sufficiency for the club.

In the summer session of the 2016 football market, Marotta, with the trusty Paratici, concluded the sale of Pogba to Manchester United for 105 million and the acquisition of Higuain from Napoli for 90 million, at the time the most expensive deals in football history. But they pale in comparison to the 222 million Psg shelled out a few weeks ago to wrest Brazilian Neymar from Barcelona. 'In 40 years,' commented Marotta, 'I have gone through all the transformations of this sector, from patronage to the advent of TV, from the invasion of finance to this new era in which the trading of players has definitively buried romanticism. Flags that embody the spirit of a team and identify it there are none and will be none no more. Totti and Buffon will be remembered as the last specimens of classic football'.

But are these transformations inevitable? Don't they end up debasing the fans' passion? 'Elite football - for the then Juventus ad, faithful to that imperturbability that only a goal scored or conceded can sometimes violate - will increasingly be a form of entertainment. The best footballers will increasingly be stars of show business. And they will live on temporary engagements, like film actors, with almost no contractual ties, except for that given show or event. We may not wish this as football lovers, but the world economy is pushing in this direction'.

In the autumn of 2018, after the Bianconeri club bought Cristiano Ronalndo in the summer, an operation that was at least as ambitious as it was expensive, around which the relationship of trust with the presidency was consumed, his relationship with the Bianconeri club ended. A few months later, the Zhang family called him to the helm of Inter, where he took over as managing director for the sports area. Years of reconstruction that led to victories, to the winning of the 20th Scudetto and the second star for the Nerazzurri this season, to a Champions League final, and to market operations always played on the edge of economic balance and sporting competence.

Until the 'unwanted' epilogue of the club's presidency. A choice of the new American ownership of Oaktree that relies on Marotta's experience to lead Inter into the Football Indutry of the 21st century.

Marotta had recently signed an agreement until 2027. In his future there is politics, not just sport. 'I would like to offer my experience to try to safeguard, at least in non-top-level football, that social and ethical value that makes sport something essential'. This is what Inter's new president said a few years ago. A proprosito that will not fail after this umpteenth turning point in his inimitable career.