Napoli splashed a princely €71.2m on Nigerian striker, Victor Osimhen, in the summer of 2020, but that amount is not enough to earn him a spot on the list of Serie A highest earners.
That honour, held formerly by ex-Juventus star Cristiano Ronaldo and Serie A’s highest earner with a €31m-a-year salary, has now been passed on to another Juventus player, Matthijs de Ligt who’s now Italian football’s best-paid player after Ronaldo’s exit.
The 22-year old former Ajax man is on an €8m-a-year deal with the Old Lady since 2018, but this could go up to €12m-a-year with add-ons.
Another Juve player Paulo Dybala is aiming to join De Ligt at the top of the tree when he signs a new €8m-a-year deal with €2m add-ons.
The Argentine is the third bet-paid player in Serie A on €7.3m-a-year salary, just behind Denmark’s Christian Eriksen who gets €7.5m.
However, the Inter star is out of action as he is not allowed to play in Serie A with a pacemaker, which he had implanted after suffering a heart attack during Denmark-Finland at the Euros last summer but Inter are paying his salary by FIFA insurance.
Aaron Ramsey, Adrien Rabiot, Zlatan Ibrahimovic and Arturo Vidal all get €7m-a-year, followed by Wojciech Szczęsny and Leonardo Bonucci (€6.5m-a-year) and Lautaro Martinez, who has recently signed a new €6m-a-year contract with Inter.
Serie A’s best-paid players (source Calcio e Finanza)
- Matthijs de Ligt €8m
- Christian Eriksen €7.5m
- Paulo Dybala €7.3m
- Aaron Ramsey €7m
- Adrien Rabiot €7m
- Zlatan Ibrahimovic €7m
- Alexis Sanchez €7m
- Arturo Vidal €6.5m
- Leonardo Bonucci €6.5m
- Wojciech Szczęsny €6.5m
- Lautaro Martinez €6m
- Alex Sandro €6m
- Kalidou Koulibaly €6m
