Serie A is the professional association football league at the top of the Italian football league system. Established in the 1929–30 season by restructuring the existing Italian championship into a national round-robin format, it operates a promotion and relegation system with Serie B. The league is run by the Lega Serie A and is widely regarded as one of Europe's strongest, home to clubs such as Juventus, Inter Milan and AC Milan.
Historical development
The Italian championship began in 1898 and was initially shaped by amateur organization. The Italian Football Federation organized it from its first edition, with an exception in 1921–22 when rival tournaments were held. From 1929–30 the competition adopted a single round-robin format and the name Serie A. The league reached its peak of international prestige in the late 1980s and early 1990s, when Italian clubs won all three major European club competitions in 1989–90, before losing its place at the top of the continental rankings from the second half of the 2000s.
Format and structure
For most of its history the league had 16 or 18 clubs, and since 2004–05 it has had 20. Each season runs from August to May, and every club plays each opponent twice, once at home and once away, for 38 matches in total. The season is split into two halves, the andata and the ritorno, each consisting of 19 matches. The champion receives the Coppa Campioni d'Italia trophy and wears the scudetto emblem the following season.