Three years after being relegated from Serie A, Parma Calcio have managed to return to the Italian top flight. A 1:1 in Bari was enough to do it. There is still one record to be broken
It was basically only a matter of time: Parma Calcio were the measure of all things in this Serie B season. With just four defeats, the city of ham and cheese was enthroned at the top for virtually the entire season, all underpinned by a strong start.
They only suffered their first defeat on matchday 9 with a 3-2 loss in Venice, by which time the team of coach and ex-Napoli and ex-Juventus professional Fabio Pecchia (who has been entrusted with the task of promotion since the summer of 2022) had only conceded four goals. This Wednesday, with a 1-1 draw at basement side Bari on matchday 36, they took the final step and thus returned to the top flight since their demise in 2021. With two games to go, they are now seven points ahead of current third-placed Venice
At the end of the day, this team was no match for experienced players such as 30-year-old Brazilian Hernani, Swiss Simon Sohm (23), former Nuremberg player Antonio-Mirko Colak (30) and top scorer Dennis Man (25) with eleven goals.
Club legend Gianluigi Buffon is also likely to be pleased and a little annoyed by Parma’s promotion. The 2006 world champion ended his illustrious career at his first professional club between 2021 and 2023 and would have loved to make his own return to Serie A.
The club, which was founded in 1913 and went through two new formations, and with which Buffon once won the UEFA Cup in 1999 alongside other icons such as Fabio Cannavaro and Hernan Crespo, only managed to do so in the first year after the goalkeeping legend’s career ended. And in a year in which even more is possible: if the current 74 points are topped up with another three, the best Serie B season in the club’s history to date (76 points in 2008/09) could be surpassed.
