For one evening, Teatro alla Scala became a stadium. Only metaphorically, of course, but the Gran Galà del Calcio AIC 2026 arrived for the first time at Milan’s most important theatre, and not only Milan’s, and Inter, almost inevitably given the way the 2025/26 season unfolded, took centre stage. Not only because Federico Dimarco was named Serie A’s Best Overall Player for 2025/26, but because the Nerazzurri swept up individual and collective honours, placing five players in the league’s Top 11 and also taking home the Club of the Year award.
But let’s start at the beginning: the Assocalciatori’s gala evening was organised by events agency Wonder Project S.r.l. and sports marketing agency Demetrio Albertini S.r.l., with Haier as Title Sponsor and Lega Serie A as a partner for the first time in its history. The idea of Gianluca Cannizzo, CEO and Founder of Wonder Project, was to choose Italy’s most prestigious stage, in the truest sense of the word, as the setting for a highly anticipated award, unique in its kind, presented to footballers by footballers themselves.
The ceremony was hosted by Federica Masolin and Fabio Caressa, following the red carpet outside Teatro alla Scala that afternoon. All the biggest names in Italian football, past and present, were there to celebrate the best players of the season, those who make up the ideal XI: goalkeepers, defenders, midfielders and forwards. The Best Overall Player is then chosen from the Top 11. There are also awards for the best young player in Serie A and Serie B, the best coach, the Club of the Year and the best referee of the season.
The only award not voted for by the players themselves, but by the public, is Goal of the Year: the editorial team at Undici, the event’s media partner, shortlisted the nominated goals, which were then put to an online vote. The Top 11 chosen by the players reflects Inter’s great season rather well. Mile Svilar (Roma) was confirmed as Goalkeeper of the Year, while Marco Palestra (Cagliari, on loan from Atalanta, now at Chelsea), Alessandro Bastoni (Inter), Manuel Akanji (Inter) and Federico Dimarco (Inter) made up the defence.
In midfield came Hakan Calhanoglu (Inter), Scott McTominay (Napoli) and Luka Modric (Milan), while the forwards were Lautaro Martinez (Inter), Nico Paz (Como) and Donyell Malen (Roma). Five Nerazzurri players in total, more than any other club, in a 4-3-3 full of imagination and quality. Inter were also named Club of the Year, and for a team that finished the season with the Double, Scudetto and Coppa Italia, it was hardly a surprise.
The Nerazzurri also claimed the biggest individual prize, with Federico Dimarco seemingly completing his journey: already included in the Gran Galà del Calcio AIC Top 11 for the third consecutive year, he was now named Serie A’s Best Overall Player. Even here, borrowing the language of politics, it could be called an almost unanimous vote: in the 2025/26 league campaign, the Nerazzurri wing-back made 35 appearances, scoring seven goals and providing 16 assists.
The other awards went to Cesc Fàbregas of Como, named Coach of the Year; Maurizio Mariani, elected Referee of the Year; Nico Paz, who received the Serie A Young Player of the Year award; and Mattia Liberali, currently at Como after spending last season at Catanzaro, who was named Serie B Young Player of the Year. Finally, though not least in importance, Francisco Conceição won the “Vota il Gol” award for his strike against Roma: a wonderful left-footed diagonal from outside the box that sent the ball straight into the top corner.
There was also room for memory at Teatro alla Scala, with a tribute to Italy’s 2006 World Cup-winning team, exactly twenty years after their triumph in Berlin: Andrea Barzagli, Gianluca Zambrotta, Simone Perrotta, Alessandro Del Piero and Ciro Ferrara, who was part of that unforgettable national team’s coaching staff, took to the stage to receive a special award. At Teatro alla Scala, even if it might seem like a contradiction, there was also an embrace of technology and modernity, with the presentation of the Haier Cam, a camera designed to offer a different perspective on matches, directly from the referee’s point of view.
As Lega Serie A CEO De Siervo and Haier Country Manager Garofalo explained, the project aims to bring spectators even closer to the action and is one of the innovative elements of the partnership between Haier and Lega Serie A. By the end of the evening, the most striking fact was still the one with which it had begun: after the Scudetto and Coppa Italia, Inter had “won” a Gran Galà del Calcio AIC that will go down in history. Five players in the Top 11, the Club of the Year award and the biggest individual honour, presented to Dimarco.
But the presence of all the stars who lit up Italy’s most evocative stage tells a story that goes beyond results, trophies won, goals scored and assists provided: football can be beauty, it can be culture. More than that, it is both. The fact that so many people had gathered outside Teatro alla Scala, all waiting to see their idols up close, confirmed just how enormous an impact Serie A has on this country, well beyond the football pitch. It is no small thing, and it cannot be taken for granted. It never is.