AC Perugia Calcio

The club was formed on 9 June 1905 from a merger of Fortebraccio and Libertas. Its modern rise started in 1974, when businessman Franco D’Attoma took over a club close to going under. Under coach Ilario Castagner Perugia won Serie B in 1974–75 and reached the top flight for the first time.

The 1978–79 side is the one everybody remembers. Perugia played 30 league games and lost none, with 11 wins and 19 draws. A 2–2 draw at Bologna on 13 May 1979 made them the first side to go through a Serie A season unbeaten, but all those draws left them on 41 points, three behind champions Milan. Walter Speggiorin top-scored with nine, and Salvatore Bagni, Pierluigi Frosio, Franco Vannini and goalkeeper Nello Malizia were key men. The next summer D’Attoma signed Paolo Rossi and agreed a deal with the Ponte pasta company, the first shirt sponsorship in Italian football. The Totonero betting scandal then caught up with the club, and Perugia were relegated in 1981.

The stadium at Pian di Massiano opened on 5 October 1975 with a 0–0 draw against Milan. Two years later, on 30 October 1977, Perugia midfielder Renato Curi collapsed five minutes into the second half of a home game against Juventus and died of a heart attack. He was 24, had played 81 games for the club since joining from Como in 1974, and had been central to the first promotion. The ground was renamed in his honour, and the seats of the Curva Nord, home to Perugia’s loudest support, spell out “R Curi” in red and white.

Luciano Gaucci became president in 1991 with Perugia in Serie C. He took them back to Serie A in 1996 and again in 1998, and his signings were rarely dull. Hidetoshi Nakata played here from 1998 to 2000. On 14 May 2000 Alessandro Calori scored the only goal against Juventus in a rain-soaked final-day game that was held up for more than an hour, handing the title to Lazio. In 2002 Gaucci stopped Ahn Jung-hwan’s wages after his golden goal knocked Italy out of the World Cup.

Then, on 29 June 2003, Perugia signed Al-Saadi Gaddafi, son of the Libyan leader. He failed a test for nandrolone that autumn, served a three-month ban and played only one Serie A match for the club, as a late substitute in a 1–0 win over Juventus. The same team, coached by Serse Cosmi, won the 2003 Intertoto Cup. In 2005 the club went bankrupt and dropped to Serie C, and it failed again in 2010, restarting in Serie D.

Perugia finished 14th in Serie C Group B in 2025–26. On 3 August 2026 the Argentine owners led by Javier Faroni agreed to sell the club to ArenaCuri srl, bringing Luciano’s son Alessandro Gaucci back as president after more than 20 years. Aimo Diana, formerly of Brescia, replaced Giovanni Tedesco as coach on a deal to June 2028. The Grifo are in Serie C Group B again for 2026–27 and won 5–1 at Campobasso on 18 October, leaving them seventh on 16 points from ten games.

Perugia are the biancorossi. The classic home kit is a red shirt with white shorts and red socks, and the griffin gives the club its nickname. The 1979–80 shirts were the first in Italy to carry a sponsor, the Ponte pasta brand.

This FanFile covers AC Perugia Calcio as a club rather than one particular jersey. Check the crest, sponsor, manufacturer label and product code on your own shirt to identify its specific season and edition.

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• AC Perugia Calcio: 2026–27 fixtures and results
• Wikipedia: the unbeaten 1978–79 season
• These Football Times: Perugia and the season of miracles
• These Football Times: the Luciano Gaucci era
• Avvenire: Calori’s goal against Juventus in May 2000
• Calciomercato: Alessandro Gaucci returns and Aimo Diana appointed, 2026

Facts checked: 21 October 2026.