Serie A rebuilt its attack this summer by importing Paris Saint-Germain's castoffs
AC Milan and Juventus spent a combined €159.2M on three players PSG no longer wanted — Gonçalo Ramos, Randal Kolo Muani and, via RB Leipzig, the pattern extends to Loïs Openda too. Serie A's €524.2M net outlay this window was largely a story of recruiting proven quality other big clubs had already decided to move on from.
Serie A clubs spent €1.06B across 105 signings and sold €540.4M across 73 deals, a €524.2M net outlay — the second-largest deficit in the top 5 after the Premier League's. The composition of the incoming business is distinctive: Gonçalo Ramos (€74M) and Randal Kolo Muani (€41.2M) both moved from Paris Saint-Germain to Serie A clubs (AC Milan and Juventus respectively), while Loïs Openda (€42.75M) arrived at Juventus from RB Leipzig and Diego Moreira (€45M) joined AC Milan from Strasbourg. None of Serie A's headline incoming deals this summer were poached from a fellow Serie A rival — every one was an import from a foreign league.
That's a specific recruitment strategy: rather than bidding against Premier League or La Liga clubs for a player's absolute peak-value window, Serie A clubs targeted players whose stock had dipped slightly at their previous club (a squad-role change, a manager who moved on) and bought at what amounts to a relative discount versus that player's ceiling valuation. Whether that strategy pays off competitively is a question for the season itself, but financially it's a coherent explanation for how Serie A built a squad-quality upgrade without ever winning a single Serie A vs Serie A bidding war.