As some of the older generations of football fans would testify, there was a time when the quality and glamour of Serie A were unrivaled.
Long before the Premier League reigned supreme, Italian football was the standard in the Old Continent. But while Calcio had always been associated with its legendary defenders, the Italian league also had a plethora of world-class forwards who left viewers in awe and their markers perturbed.
But which strikers managed to score the biggest tally in a single Serie A campaign?
Who Scored the Most Goals in a One Season in Serie A?
Instead of one answer, we have three. Gino Rossetti, Gonzalo Higuain and Ciro Immobile share the record for the most Serie A goals in one season. The three bombers are tied with 36 strikes for each.
While Higuain and Immobile are modern-day stars, Rossetti accomplished this feat back in the 1928/29 season while representing Torino. Ironically, this was the very last campaign before the launching of Serie A. Back then, the Italian top flight was known as “Divisione Nazionale”.
Serie A Record Goals in a Season (Top 10)
While we intended to make it a Top 10, it turned out to be Top 13 since several players are being tied with 31 goals per season. This includes the one and only Cristiano Ronaldo.
Interestingly, the Portuguese superstar didn’t finish that campaign as top-scorer, as the honor went to Ciro Immobile who enjoyed a historic 2019/20 season. Nevertheless, CR7 managed to earn the Capocannonieri Award (which has been rebranded as the “Paolo Rossi Award”) by bagging 29 goals for Juventus in the following campaign, though his achievements in Turin remain a far cry from his heyday in Madrid.
| # | Player | Nationality | Season | Club | Goals |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| =1 | Gino Rossetti | Italian | 1928/29 | Torino | 36 |
| =1 | Gonzalo Higuain | Argentine | 2015/16 | Napoli | 36 |
| =1 | Ciro Immobile | Italian | 2019/20 | Lazio | 36 |
| =4 | Ferenc Hirzer | Hungarian | 1925/26 | Juventus | 35 |
| =4 | Julio Libonatti | Argentine, Italian | 1927/28 | Torino | 35 |
| =4 | Gunnar Nordahl | Swedish | 1949/50 | Milan | 35 |
| 7 | Gunnar Nordahl | Swedish | 1950/51 | Milan | 34 |
| 8 | Antonio Valentin Angelillo | Argentine | 1958/59 | Inter | 33 |
| =9 | Adolfo Baloncieri | Italian | 1927/28 | Torino | 31 |
| =9 | Giuseppe Meazza | Italian | 1929/30 | Inter | 31 |
| =9 | Felice Borel | Italian | 1933/34 | Juventus | 31 |
| =9 | Luca Toni | Italian | 2005/06 | Fiorentina | 31 |
| =9 | Cristiano Ronaldo | Portuguese | 2019/20 | Juventus | 31 |
Gino Rossetti (36 Goals in 30 Appearances – 1928/29)
Gino Rossetti is a Torino legend who won the league title with the Granata in 1927/28. However, his most prolific campaign came in 1928/29 when he scored 36 goals in his 30 appearances, an incredible feat that remained unmatched until 2016.
Interestingly, this achievement occurred only one year following Dixie Dean’s all-time record for the most goals in single league season.
Since Rossetti’s legendary accomplishment ensued just months before the launching of the first-ever Serie A campaign, some fans and observers opt to overlook him. Nonetheless, the Divisione Nazionale was the predecessor of the modern-day Serie A, so it’s unfair to drop his name from the record books for a mere formality.
Gonzalo Higuain (36 Goals in 35 Appearances – 2015/16)
Gonzalo Higuain arguably enjoyed his best football while representing Napoli between 2013 and 2016. But his final campaign in southern Italy remains one for the archives, as he managed to equal Rossetti’s tally by scoring 36 goals.
The Argentine achieved this feat by scoring a hat-trick on the final day of the campaign against Frosinone. More impressively, he accumulated this outstanding tally without acting as the team’s designated penalty-taker.
Ciro Immobile (36 Goals in 37 Appearances – 2019/20)
Ciro Immobile is the modern-day king of the Capocannoniere Award (which stands for the top Serie A striker award). The Italian bomber has already won the award four times, and remains one short of Gunnar Nordahl’s record.
Nonetheless, the Lazio star outdone the Swedish legend but scoring 36 goals in a single campaign, tying the record set by Rossetti and Higuain. In the 2019/20 campaign, not even a worldwide pandemic or a lengthy stop could derail Ciro’s momentum, who eventually secured his place in the history books by scoring on the final matchday against Napoli
