Where can the story of a transfer wizard begin? From the green field? From the coach's bench? If Juventus is a European giant again, if the football world can meet Pirlo's genius again, he is the reason. Introducing Beppe Marotta.
I think where Guiseppe 'Beppe' Marotta's career started and where he now summarizes the story of an ideal football wizard in reality, not fiction.
Beppe Marotta's story began in 1978, when he was only 21 years old, as the infrastructure coordinator of his hometown team, Varese.
It was obvious that he had a talent for management, as he returned the club to Serie B in his first season as the Sporting Director of the team he took on at the age of 22.
Giuseppe "Beppe" Marotta (born 25 March 1957) is an Italian football executive who is currently the chairman and CEO of Italian football club Inter Milan. In 2014, he was inducted into the Italian Football Hall of Fame.
Marotta, who has "matured" over the years with the experience of the sub-sections of Italian football culture, has reached Serie B with many different clubs and returned.
But his breakthrough came in 1995 when he returned Venezia to Serie A for the first time in more than 30 years. Five seasons later, Venezia would return to Serie B. But there was no turning back for Marotta. After five clubs, 22 years, and countless declines and exits on his journey in 1978, he had now graduated to the top of Italian football.
After keeping Atalanta in the middle of the table for two consecutive seasons, he had seen the intricacies and difficulties of the football world at every level in Italy and was fully prepared to take his magic wand to the next level.
RISE WITH SAMPDORIA
In 2002, he went to Sampdoria, where he would prove his maturity as a football player to the whole of Europe. The olive oil millionaire owner of the club wanted to return the team from Serie B to A, but he could not promise big money.
With his 24 years of experience, it became clear that Marotta was the right man to go to when they returned to Serie A in his first season.
From now on it would only be upwards for both Marotta and Sampdoria. In his first year at Italy's top level, he made four critical transfers to the squad from Serie B, only paying a transfer fee for one.
In its first year, that team clung to the middle ranks of the league, finished eighth, and lost its chance for the UEFA Cup by falling one step behind. The next season, the squad, to which 13 new players were added by spending only 2.3 million Euros in transfer fees, missed the Champions League by one point this time.
Marotta managed to make Sampdoria a real Serie A team in three seasons, "for a penny" for the football world. But their rise was stalled by two mid-table finishes in two consecutive seasons.
Beppe did not remain silent and took out his wand again.
Football's talent market and the values they find are always volatile and unstable. Perhaps the secret of real transfer kings is to see the great talents that are left among these waves and whose value is "undervalued".
This was how Marotta pulled off his first big trick, which he would later repeat with different examples: He loaned Antonio Cassano, who was persona non grata at Real Madrid, with an option to buy at a paltry price.
Many thought he was taking a big gamble. After all, he was bringing a troubled man, whose career was full of uncertainties, to a mid-table team as a savior.
This gamble would pay big dividends, and Marotta would prove that the move was not a gamble, with what he acquired from great talents that were viewed with suspicion during the rest of his career.
Sampdoria finished sixth in the league in Cassano's first season. Even though they experienced a big decline the next year, the new effect made with the change of coach took hold: Marotta left Sampdoria, which he bought as a Serie B team in 2002, as a member of the Champions League in 2010.
Now it was time for big tricks on the big stage.
He joined Juventus in May 2010, following the "Sampdoria formula". He came to Vecchias together with Delneri, who made the blue-reds fourth.
Despite spending up to €60 million, new transfers, and the continuation of the winning formula, Juve remained in seventh place, as they did last season. He couldn't even get out of the group in the Europa League.
What Marotta had to do was not to repeat a working plan, but to adapt to the conditions and situation and make an efficient and new plan, as he had done throughout his career.
And so he did: He made a decision that many viewed with skepticism and named the team's former captain, Antonio Conte, as the boss of the club. However, he would have the last laugh, with a 28-game unbeaten streak, a league-cup double, and Conte being declared the new genius of Italian football.
He made two transfers that would change the course of European football in the summer of 2011. He bought Andrea Pirlo for free from Milan, where he was treated as a waste, and Chilean Vidal, who shined at Bayer, for €12.5 million.
He had already formed the backbone of the invincible Juventus with Bonucci, Barzagli, Pirlo, and Vidal in two transfer periods. But he still hadn't pulled off his biggest trick.
In the summer of 2012, a 19-year-old young talent who had played seven official matches with Manchester United and did not seem likely to find a shirt in the world giant went to Turin for free. That was young Paul Pogba.
The man who took advantage of Pogba's expiring contract was none other than Marotta. The next five years changed a lot for both Marotta, Pogba, and Juventus.
After winning its first championship in six years, Juve became champions in a row until they sent Pogba away, and strengthened its status as the only giant of Italian football, which was shaken by relegation, a little more every season.
Pogba returned to Manu, whom he left without a transfer, for a record fee of €110 million.
Marotta, on the other hand, is respected in every corner of the football world as the man who built the midfield of a team that made the Champions League final for €12 million, and bought two of the best midfielders modern football has seen without paying a penny, and was the man who first trusted Conte, the man who determined the course of the game.
Before finishing, one should take a deep breath and stop: Not every transfer or every move of Beppe can be considered a product of genius. He should even say that, like every gambler, he sometimes takes too much risk.
But he manages to cover up every mistake he makes with compensation, to find great success with small moves, and most importantly, to establish the squads that will bring home the cup and hit the target, no matter how little or no budget they have.
What more could you expect from a football manager?
Marotta is currently the president and CEO of the Italian football club Inter Milan.