By Sofia Bianchi
This is the first instalment in a short series about the rise of Serie A club Como. You can read more about their story at ForzaComo.com
There are two different projects underway at Como. One is building a team good enough to compete with Europe’s leading clubs. The other is building a lasting infrastructure.
The first is delivering results at remarkable speed. Como’s 9–1 victory at Lens on 4 November equalled the Champions League’s largest winning margin and left the debutants fourth in the league-phase table after four games. The second project is harder to measure, but just as important.
That distinction matters for anyone looking at Como as a model for other clubs. Investment can accelerate recruitment, attract a gifted coach and improve the working environment. It cannot instantly produce the commercial income, academy graduates or organisational experience that established European powers have accumulated over decades.
Como are attempting to close that gap while already competing against those clubs. Their story is therefore a useful case study in the possibilities of ambitious ownership, and in the risks of growing the first team faster than the institution around it.
What the owners are actually buying
The Hartono family-backed ownership group took over through SENT Entertainment in 2019, when Como were in Serie D. By 2024 the club had returned to Serie A. European football has followed, dramatically changing the scale of the operation.
The most obvious purchase has been playing talent. The less visible one is time.
A club with limited reserves may have to sell a promising player before he reaches his sporting peak, accept a manager whose approach does not suit the squad, or postpone an infrastructure improvement to meet immediate costs. Substantial backing creates alternatives. It can allow an owner to tolerate expensive development periods, and a coach to work through problems rather than abandon his ideas after a few defeats.
That is a competitive advantage, but only if the additional time is used well. Patient funding should enable better decisions. It should not remove the need to assess them.
For Como, the opportunity is to spend now on capabilities that remain useful later: recruitment knowledge, coaching, facilities and a commercial operation with repeat customers. The danger is committing to costs that stay high even if results or ownership priorities change.
Calling the project a fairy tale obscures that choice. Como are a historically modest club with unusually powerful financial support. The interesting question is what they can turn that support into.
Recruitment works when the pieces improve one another
The presence of Cesc Fàbregas makes the sporting investment more coherent than a simple collection of expensive players.
His football asks defenders to participate in possession, midfielders to receive under pressure and attackers to coordinate their movements rather than wait for isolated individual chances. Those demands provide a way to judge potential recruits. A player’s reputation matters less if he cannot perform the actions the team repeatedly needs.
The relationship between Nico Paz and Tasos Douvikas offers the clearest example. Paz benefits from a forward who attacks the spaces his passes can reach. Douvikas benefits from teammates who recognise those runs. The value lies partly in the combination, not merely in the individual quality of either player.
There is useful evidence beneath the European headlines. After the opening ten league matches, Como’s Serie A figures showed 23 points, with 18 goals from 18.11 expected goals. At that stage, Douvikas had five league goals from 4.69 xG, while Paz led the squad for both shots and key passes.
Those numbers do not establish that every transfer was good value, or that the team will sustain its position. They do suggest an attack producing the chances to support its goals, rather than relying solely on an extraordinary run of finishing. Evaluating recruitment requires that distinction: a dramatic result attracts attention, while recurring contributions help justify the investment.
For another club, the lesson is to decide which problems a signing must solve before negotiating his price. Buying several talented players who require incompatible styles can be more expensive than buying a less celebrated group that functions together.
The Fàbregas advantage
Fàbregas contributes more than tactics. His playing career gives him credibility with recruits, his name attracts international attention, and his coaching gives the project a recognisable sporting purpose.
Those roles reinforce each other. A young player can see both a potential route to improvement and a platform on which that improvement will be noticed. The club gains a more persuasive recruitment proposition than salary alone.
That combination helps explain how Como are turning financial backing into sporting progress. Sustaining it brings a different challenge: building income capable of supporting the ambition. The next part of this series examines the accounts and the commercial strategy behind the football.
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