Juventus Chases a Return to the Top with Spalletti, Three Years After Losing Its Podium Spot

One number sums up the scale of the fall better than anything else: Juventus hasn't finished on the Serie A podium since 2023/24, when it came in third. Before that came an entire decade in which the rest of Italy was essentially playing for second place. Nine straight Scudettos between 2012 and 2020, a record not even Bayern Munich could match when it reached eleven consecutive titles in 2023, though by a different route. That Juventus gave no one any room to breathe. This version, with Luciano Spalletti now in charge, is searching for a way back to a place that no longer belongs to it by right.

The question hanging over Turin is an uncomfortable one: how do you explain to fans used to winning everything that some feats simply can't be repeated? Juventus remains, by a wide margin, Italy's most successful club with 36 Scudettos, far ahead of Inter's 21, its closest historical rival. That weight, combined with a motto as demanding as "winning isn't the most important thing, it's the only thing," means any rebuilding process gets lived through with a particular kind of anxiety.

A union born of mutual need

Spalletti and Juventus found each other in October 2025, and it wasn't a case of love at first sight, it was convenience for both sides. The coach had been fired from the Italy national team months earlier, following a 3-0 loss to Norway in World Cup qualifying, a result that ended up sealing the Azzurri's third straight absence from a World Cup. Juventus, meanwhile, was watching the title race slip away yet again and needed a big name to reignite hope.

The deal was sealed for just eight months. It also forced Spalletti to quietly walk back the promise he'd made in 2023, when he won the title with Napoli, got the club crest tattooed on his skin, and said he would never coach another team. Keeping certain promises, it turns out, can come at a cost.

The 2025/26 season ended in sixth place, a finish that satisfies no one in Turin. The Champions League, the competition Juventus lifted twice (most recently in 1996, the same year it also beat River Plate for the Intercontinental Cup), will once again be watched from the outside. Even so, the club's leadership decided in April to stick with Spalletti.

Something about his style has won over the front office, even if it isn't always comfortable, not even for them. As early as matchday one, despite winning 1-0 on the road against Frosinone, the coach didn't hesitate to publicly question his starting forward, French striker Randall Kolo Muani, the same player who was denied by Dibu Martinez's famous save in the Qatar 2022 final.

He needs to realize he didn't play for two years, and there must be a reason for that. Kolo knows how to hold possession, find space, and he's physically strong, but in these matches you need him to score goals.Luciano Spalletti

The comment carries even more weight when you consider Kolo Muani managed just one goal during his recent stint at Tottenham, and that Juventus still went ahead and signed him in a deal that could reach $58 million. Spalletti clearly wasn't brought in to make anyone feel good, that much is obvious. It remains to be seen how the squad handles that kind of blunt honesty.

If it doesn't win, it isn't Juventus again

One of the pillars of the project is Kenan Yildiz, the Turkish forward Juventus signed in 2022 out of Bayern Munich's youth academy when he was just 17. Spalletti was dealt an early blow: a left foot injury will keep Yildiz out for at least three months, right after the player had been swirling in transfer rumors linking him with a move to Arsenal.

That kind of interest from other clubs in Yildiz, along with the rumors surrounding Nicolas Gonzalez and Jonathan David, is a symptom of something the Juventus of the winning decade barely had to deal with. When a team is winning, it's much harder for rivals to poach its stars; if anything, it becomes the preferred destination, as in 2018 when Cristiano Ronaldo arrived from a Real Madrid side that had just won Europe. Now the wind is blowing the other way, and the players notice.

Spalletti, 67 years old and well aware he won't have many more chances to manage a big club, knows the order of operations is simple: you have to win first, and only then will the stars who currently look elsewhere come back around.

There are reasons for optimism. Colombian defender Jhon Lucumi, who was a key figure in Colombia's strong World Cup campaign, arrived this transfer window from Bologna for just over $23 million and joins fellow countryman Juan Cabal in the squad. Signings like this feed the idea that this could be the year of the return.

Juventus starts a notch below the other contenders, especially an Inter side that has claimed the lion's share of the major trophies in recent years and even came close to the Champions League in 2025, before falling in the final to PSG. Spalletti has an enormous job ahead of him, not just to get Juventus growing again but to catch up to the clubs that didn't waste time while the Old Lady was busy rebuilding. Still, no one in Italy is willing to fully count this club out: sooner or later, it always finds its way back to the top.