Roma coach Ivan Juric (Photo by Marco Luzzani/Getty Images)
Atalanta are on the verge of signing Ivan Juric as their new coach, hoping he can follow in the footsteps of mentor Gian Piero Gasperini.
The club was forced to seek another tactician after nine incredible years under Gasperini, who qualified for the Champions League five times in the last seven seasons and won the Europa League.
With that in mind, La Dea directors are trying to follow his lead with a coach who has similar ideas, and there are plenty of those around Serie A who consider him a mentor.
Juric follows Gasperini ideas with Atalanta
After asking around Thiago Motta and Raffaele Palladino, Atalanta have settled on Juric as the ideal heir to Gasperini.
The Croatian was his midfielder at Crotone and Genoa, then acted as assistant manager at Inter and Palermo.
They have drawn up a two-year contract worth €2m per season plus another €500,000 in fairly easy to achieve performance-related bonuses.
Atalanta’s co-owners, Stephen Pagliuca and the Percassi family, must give the final all-clear and that is likely over the next 24-48 hours.
It has been a dismal 2024-25 campaign for Juric, who lasted 12 matches at Roma before he was fired, then had 16 games with Southampton ending in relegation from the Premier League.
Between the two clubs, he oversaw six wins, four draws and 18 defeats in all competition.
