Inter Milan most expensive signings: Champions League finalists’ 11 biggest buys

Inter Milan have become Champions League finalists for the second time in three years – and that’s with a squad that only contains one of their nine most expensive signings of all time.

Over the past five years, Inter have become Serie A’s most stable club. They have run a strong operation in the transfer market, often picking up players in shrewd deals and getting the best out of some that other clubs would have discarded.

But make no mistake, Inter have shown their financial muscle before as well. Historically, they have broken the world transfer record four times – most recently in 1999.

Here, TEAMtalk takes a look at Inter’s top 10 (which is actually a top 11 at the moment due to a tie for 10th place) most expensive signings of all time, with some hits and some misses.

=10. Davide Frattesi (€31.4m)

The player who scored the goal to take Inter into the 2025 Champions League final, Frattesi generated a great deal of interest after a pair of productive seasons with Sassuolo.

Inter won the race to sign the midfielder in 2023, initially taking him on loan in a deal that would become permanent the following summer.

Sassuolo had spent a fairly sizeable €5m to sign Frattesi from Roma’s academy in 2017, when he was still a few months away from his 18th birthday. Although it took four years for him to become a first-team regular, their faith paid off.

Indeed, Inter gave Sassuolo a significant profit when they bought Frattesi for €31.4m.

Since then, he has consolidated his status as a full Italy international. He isn’t always a regular starter for Inter, but his extra-time winner against Barcelona in the Champions League semi-final showed his value.

=10. Benjamin Pavard (€31.4m)

After four years of service, Pavard entered the final 12 months of his Bayern contract in 2023 and when Inter came calling, they decided to cash in.

The fee for the versatile defender was an initial €30m, with some add-ons making the deal even more enticing for Bayern.

Pavard has played more than 30 times for Inter in both of his first two seasons with the club.

9. Milan Skriniar (€34m)

Following a breakout season with Sampdoria in 2016-17, Skriniar became one of Serie A’s most coveted young defenders.

It was Inter who got a deal done for the Slovakia international, by offering Sampdoria a package deal that also included Gianluca Caprari going the other way.

All in, it meant Skriniar was a €34m asset and the most expensive Slovak footballer of all time. In terms of profit for Sampdoria, they banked more than six times their investment.

There would be no profit for Inter, though, as Skriniar eventually ran his contract down and left on a free transfer for Paris Saint-Germain in 2023 after 246 appearances and five trophies.

=7. Hernan Crespo (€36m)

Two years before he joined Inter in 2002, Crespo had become the most expensive player in history by joining Lazio for more than €55m.

Inter got the striker in for less than that, but still at a significant price of €36m. He was identified as a replacement for Ronaldo, who had gone to Real Madrid.

Crespo had an injury-hit season at Inter, scoring 16 goals from 30 games, before leaving for Chelsea a year later.

Inter went on to re-sign Crespo on a two-year loan starting from 2006, after which he completed a permanent return for free for a final campaign with the club.

By the end of his spell, Crespo had still made more appearances for Inter on loan (69) than as their permanent player (47).

=7. Geoffrey Kondogbia (€36m)

Kondogbia was 22 years old when Inter took him to Italy on the back of a two-year spell at Monaco.

The initial investment was worth €31m. Reports about the how much the add-ons were worth varied, with the cost to be taken up to between €36m and €40m.

Kondogbia made 50 Serie A appearances over two seasons, but became surplus to requirements for Inter, who sent him on loan to Valencia in return for Joao Cancelo in 2017.

When the sale became permanent, Inter banked €25m.

Kondogbia reflected in 2018 of his time at Inter, while still on loan at Valencia: “During two seasons I had four/five different coaches and so many players would leave and arrive. For this reason, especially for a young player, I found it very difficult to integrate and put in performances of my usual standard.”

6. Radja Nainggolan (€38m)

Although born in Belgium, Nainggolan had spent more than 10 years playing in Italy after starting his career with Piacenza.

Most famous for successful spells with Cagliari and Roma, Nainggolan joined Inter in 2018, a few months after scoring in the Champions League semi-finals for the latter.

The package was worth €38m, but that included a base fee of €24m for the dynamic midfielder and the €14m-valued pair of Nicolo Zaniolo and Davide Santon going the other way.

Nainggolan confessed to feeling more sad about leaving Roma than happy about joining Inter and later hinted he might not have made the move if he’d known the selling club would change their coach and sporting director within less than a year.

Inter never quite saw the best of the Belgian and sent him on two separate loans back to Cagliari before terminating his contract in 2021 so he could join Antwerp for his first experience of playing for a club from his native country.

5. Achraf Hakimi (€40m)

After his impressive two-year loan at Borussia Dortmund from Real Madrid, Hakimi was sold by the Spanish giants to Inter in 2020.

The fee was in the region of €40m. Hakimi signed a five-year contract, but only spent a season in Italy before Inter found themselves under financial pressure.

Needing a swift sale, they cashed in on the wing-back for €60m, with buying club Paris Saint-Germain also tabling up to €11m in add-ons.

Hakimi was a crucial part of the Inter side that Antonio Conte won the Scudetto with in 2020-21. Shrewdly, they were able to replace him for just €12.5m, rising to €15m, with Denzel Dumfries.

4. Joao Mario (€45m)

The purchase of Joao Mario from Sporting CP was Inter’s most expensive in 17 years, when they took him to Italy in 2016.

Sporting received an initial €40m for the midfielder, with another €5m in bonuses.

Things didn’t go the way Inter hoped, though, and Joao Mario spent half of his five years on the books out on loan elsewhere, including a six-month stint in the Premier League with West Ham United.

A permanent exit came in 2021 when Inter cancelled his contract by mutual consent, thus making their second biggest ever loss on a player.

=2. Christian Vieri (€49m)

In 1999, Inter set a new benchmark for spending in football by breaking the world transfer record to sign Christian Vieri from Lazio for just shy of €50m.

Vieri had only spent a season with Lazio, but they just about doubled their money on him thanks to his move north.

Inter reunited him with head coach Marcello Lippi, who had Vieri at his disposal for Juventus a few years earlier.

Ultimately, Inter became the only club where Vieri would stay for more than one season; he stayed for six, scoring 123 goals from 190 games.

There was an agreement to terminate his contract in 2005, which led to a free move to city rivals AC Milan. In stark contrast, he only scored twice from 14 games for the Rossoneri.

GO FURTHER 👉 Every transfer that broke the world record over the last 30 years

=2. Nicolo Barella (€50m)

Vieri’s fee remained unmatched by Inter for 20 years, until a summer in which they set their new transfer record.

But a few weeks before that, they also committed to spending an eventual €49m fee on Barella by setting up a loan-to-buy deal with Cagliari.

After three full seasons in Serie A, Barella was the biggest commodity in the league outside the clubs in the European places.

Inter paid Cagliari a loan fee of €12m before another payment of €25m to keep him the following summer. There were also up to €13m of add-ons negotiated.

Barella has now played more than 200 times in Serie A for Inter and has been named in the Serie A Team of the Year in every season he has played for them.

1. Romelu Lukaku (€80m)

Scoring 42 goals from 96 games wasn’t enough for Lukaku to avoid being considered a Manchester United flop after their signing of him from Everton for up to £90m.

However, Inter still saw his worth and broke their club transfer record after 20 years to take him to San Siro in 2019.

Antonio Conte got the best out of Lukaku for Inter. During his first season in Italy, the Belgium striker scored 34 goals from 51 games.

The following season, Inter won their first Scudetto in more than a decade. Lukaku again played an important role, scoring 30 goals from 44 games in all competitions.

Consequently, Chelsea were encouraged to break their transfer record to reunite with Lukaku. The £97.5m they paid helped make him the most expensive player in footballing history in terms of cumulative transfer fees.

Inter replaced him by snapping up Edin Dzeko from Roma on an initial free transfer, which ultimately became worth €1.5m due to a clause activated once they qualified for the Champions League.

Meanwhile, Lukaku struggled back in the Premier League, even more so than when he’d been at Man Utd. He was allowed to return to Inter on loan for the 2022-23 season, adding a further 14 goals in their colours to his collection.

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