Juventus' 10 best transfers of all time
Martin Macdonald
- 9 Oct 2024 05:55 CDT
- 7 min read
Juventus are the best-supported team in Italy and have been the most successful team in Serie A history.
The Bianconeri have enjoyed unprecedented recent success in Italian football, and fell just at the last hurdle in their pursuit of 10 titles in a row in 2020/21 when they surrendered the Scudetto to Inter.
In the nine years previous they were unstoppable and that is largely due to their smart investments in players.
Over the last 25 yearsor so they have signed players who would turn into legendary figures at the club, some of whom are still there to this day.
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So, since 2000, who have been Juventus' best transfers?
David Trezeguet- €25m (from Monaco, 2000)
David Trezeguet had scored 60 goals in 113 appearances for Monaco before making the big-money switch to Juventus at the turn of the century.
In his first season he scored 14 league goals despite featuring as a backup to Filippo Inzaghi and Alessandro Del Piero.
However, the next season he took his chance after being granted more minutes under Marcelo Lippi and finished the campaign as the league's top scorer with 22 strikes.
Trezeguet remains a beloved figure among the Juventus fans as not only was the Frenchman there for a decade, but he crucially stuck by the Bianconeri during their relegation to Serie B following the Calciopoli scandal.
Gianluigi Buffon - €52m (from Parma, 2001)
Gianluigi Buffon became the world’s most expensive goalkeeper when he moved from Parma to Juventus – a record that would stand for close to 20 years.
While some players can be burdened by such huge transfer fees, Buffon lived up to his price tag in stunning fashion, becoming arguably the most iconic goalkeeper of his generation.
A 20-year stint at Juve was interrupted only by one spell at Paris Saint-Germain, but while he won a string of domestic titles as well as the World Cup, the Champions League, remarkably, eluded him.
In 2021, he moved back to Parma and he eventually retired at the grand old age of 45.
Pavel Nedved - €38.7m (from Lazio, 2001)
Pavel Nedved was signed by Juventus to replace the great Zinedine Zidane, and the Czech did well to come close to having the same influence on the team as the great Frenchman.
He led the club to the 2003 Champions League final and would win both World and European Footballer of the Year later that year.
In all, he would remain with the club eight years until his retirement, even sticking by them when they were relegated to Serie B following the Calciopoli scandal. In total, he played 327 times for the club at which he later became a director, and scored 65 times.
Lilian Thuram - €36m (from Parma, 2001)
The sale of Zidane to Real Madrid in the summer of 2001 allowed Juventus to go on a meaningful spending spree, as in addition to Buffon and Nedved they would sign another future legend in Lilian Thuram.
In his period with Juve, Thuram was recognised as of of the best full-backs in the world, equally as effective on the left as on the right.
He won two Serie A titles in his time in Turin when the Italian top flight was incredibly competitive, and also helped the club reach the Champions League final in 2003.
Thuram would leave in 2006 to join Barcelona. His son Khephren would join Juventus in 2024.
Fabio Cannavaro - SWAP with Fabian Carini, 2004)
Remember Fabian Carini? Probably not. The goalkeeper was a makeweight in the 2004 deal that saw Fabio Cannavaro move from Inter to Juventus.
If Carini featured in only four times in a three-year career at Inter, Cannavaro would write a legacy that will see him remembered as one of the greatest defenders of all time.
Two years after the loan deal was concluded, he was the star of the Italy team that won the 2006 World Cup, paving the way for a move to Real Madrid, albeit in inglorious circumstances due to the Calciopoli scandal.
Though his time at Juve was short, it will be fondly remembered as he was named the 2005 Serie A Defender of the Year, the 2006 Defender of the Year, the 2006 Serie A Italian Footballer of the Year and the 2006 Serie A Footballer of the Year.
Giorgio Chiellini - €4.3m (from Roma, 2005)
If nobody thought it before, Giorgio Chiellini's performance at Euro 2020 further cemented his status as one of the best centre-backs of the last 20 years.
Whether it be his jokes with Jordi Alba or THAT foul on Bukayo Saka, he was probably the most talked-about player of the tournament.
Such brilliance was seen by Juventus fans for 18 years though as it was in 2005 that they bought out Roma's ownership to own Chiellini outright - for just €4.3m.
He would become a Juventus legend, making over 500 appearances and winning 10 Scudetti.
Jose Mourinho once said he and Leonardo Bonucci should open up their own training school for defenders.
Leonardo Bonucci - €15.5m (from Bari, 2010)
Apart from an ill-fated period at Milan in the 2017/18 season, Bonucci was at the centre of Juventus' outstanding defence for a decade.
While Chiellini was the no-nonsense hard-hitting partner, Bonucci was the more graceful of the pair, helping to instigate attacks from the back.
Don't let that fool you, though, as the Italy international could scrap with the best of them.
The Chiellini-Bonucci partnership will go down as one of the greatest of all time in Italian football.
Andrea Pirlo - FREE (from Milan, 2011)
Famously described by Buffon as the “signing of the century”, Andrea Pirlo’s move from Milan to Juventus in 2011 undoubtedly represented a shifting of the tide in Italian football and confirmed that the Turin club meant business.
In his first season at the club Pirlo helped Juventus win the Serie A title by creating more assists than any other player in Italian football and creating 500 more passes than any other player in the league that season. A remarkable feat that saw the player be named in the Serie A and UEFA teams of the year awards.
With Pirlo in the team, Juventus won four consecutive league titles in a period that saw Pirlo earn nominations for the Ballon d’Or award on no less than two occasions and while his final game for Juve was a 3-1 defeat to Barcelona in the Champions League final, it did little to dim the remarkable amount of success the cultured midfielder enjoyed during his four-year spell in northern Italy.
He later returned as coach in 2020-21 where he won a Coppa Italia and Supercoppa Italiana in his one season.
Andrea Barzagli - €600k (from Wolfsburg, 2011)
After taking Wolfsburg to new heights in the Bundesliga, Andrea Barzagli returned to Italy in January 2011 when he signed a contract to move to Juventus.
Under the defensive rigidness of Antonio Conte’s new tactics at the club, Barzagli became an integral part of Juventus’ system and quickly developed into one of the club’s most consistent performers.
Alongside Bonucci and Chiellini, Conte’s 3-5-2 formation got the very best out of Barzagli and took Juventus back to the very top of Italian and European football and established the former Palermo prospect as one of the World’s best defenders.
Over the course of nine seasons in Turin, Barzagli won eight Serie A league titles, four Italian Cups and helped Juventus reach two Champions League finals. A period of unprecedented success that was in no small part down to his defending.
Paul Pogba - FREE (from Man Utd, 2012)
After famously burning bridges with Sir Alex Ferguson through the manner in which he left Manchester United, Paul Pogba likely knew that his career would be made or ruined based on what he made of his move to Juventus in 2012.
After scoring five goals in his first season, the towering midfielder clicked into gear in his second season at the club with nine goals and 16 assists in all competitions and picking up more appearances than any other player at the Turin club.
As Pogba’s experience at Juventus grew, so too did his influence over the way the team played and by the time he was concluding a third, consecutive title-winning season with the club he was wearing the famous No.10 shirt and calling the shots in the middle of the pitch.
By the time Pogba was once again flirting with a return to Old Trafford, he had established himself as one of Europe’s best midfielders and was shortlisted for the UEFA Best Player in Europe Award, alongside making the 2015 UEFA Team of the Year.
He moved to Man Utd for a world record fee over over €100m in 2016 before returning to Juventus in 2022 on another free transfer. His return to Juve was a disaster, though, as he missed almost the entirety of his first season through injury and then was banned for 18 months after failing a doping test.
