Football quiz: Premier League players who have been loaned to Serie A clubs

1. Pablo Marí has become the latest player to leave Arsenal this summer, joining Monza on loan. Marí spent the second half of last season on loan at Udinese, scoring twice. But against which clubs?

   1. Bologna and Inter

   2. Fiorentina and Spezia

   3. Salernitana and Empoli

   4. Sassuolo and Napoli

2. José Mourinho described Andriy Shevchenko’s arrival at Chelsea in 2006 as “a day when the dream became reality”. Two years later, after an underwhelming spell in London, Shevchenko returned to Milan on loan. How many Serie A goals did he score that season?

   1. Three

   2. Five

   3. 26

   4. None

3. Chelsea made a habit of sending misfit strikers to Italy in the mid-2000s. Hernán Crespo was shipped out to Milan for the 2004-05 season and ended up going all the way to the Champions League final. He scored twice for Milan as they raced into a 3-0 lead, before Liverpool produced the mother of all comebacks and won on penalties. Who scored Milan’s other goal in the final?

   1. Jaap Stam

   2. Kaká

   3. Paolo Maldini

   4. Andriy Shevchenko

4. After going back to Chelsea and winning the Premier League in 2006, Crespo returned to Serie A, initially on loan, with Inter. In Crespo’s first season back in Italy, Roberto Mancini’s side won the league by a then-record 97 points. They only lost one Serie A game all season – to which club?

   1. Udinese

   2. Roma

   3. Lazio

   4. Milan

5. Having been a regular during Jacques Santini’s short reign at Spurs, Reto Ziegler eventually fell out of favour under Martin Jol and departed, initially on loan, to Sampdoria in 2007. However, he featured in Jol’s first game in charge: a 5-4 defeat to Arsenal at White Hart Lane in which Ziegler set up Spurs’ final goal with a dinked pass over the defence. Who scored it?

   1. Jermain Defoe

   2. Noureddine Naybet

   3. Frédéric Kanouté

   4. Ledley King

6. Which former Manchester United player, who went on loan to Fiorentina in 2014 before leaving Old Trafford the following year, was so frustrating to manage that, according to former coach Mick Clegg, Alex Ferguson wanted to hit him with a stick?

   1. Rafael

   2. Fábio

   3. Bebé

   4. Anderson

7. Like Shevchenko seven years previous, Mario Balotelli made an unsuccessful return to Milan on loan in 2015 amid an equally unsuccessful spell in the Premier League with Liverpool. Balotelli scored one goal in the league that season. Who was Milan’s top scorer with 18?

   1. Carlos Bacca

   2. Keisuke Honda

   3. M’Baye Niang

   4. Kevin-Prince Boateng

8. Arsenal loaned Wojciech Szczesny to Roma in 2015 soon after he was caught smoking in the showers following an admittedly depressing 2-0 defeat to Southampton. Which future Premier League-winning goalkeeper served as Szczesny’s deputy in his second season at the Stadio Olimpico?

   1. Ederson

   2. Alisson

   3. Asmir Begovic

   4. Claudio Bravo

9. In a less successful goalkeeping adventure, Joe Hart joined Torino on loan from Manchester City in 2016. His time in Italy is mainly remembered for high-profile mistakes, but how many clean sheets did he keep in 36 league appearances?

   1. One

   2. 12

   3. Three

   4. Five

10. After ending a wretched spell at Manchester United by joining Inter, initially on loan, in 2019, Alexis Sánchez scored – and was sent off for diving – as they beat Sampdoria 3-1 in his third appearance. That ended a run of 14 games at club level without a goal. Which side had he last scored against?

    1. Arsenal

    2. Newcastle

    3. Manchester City

    4. Liverpool

Solutions

1:B - A nice, easy warm-up question for the Serie A nerds out there., 2:D - In a classic case of “never go back”, Shevchenko failed to find the net in 18 league appearances, 3:C - Maldini lashed home at a set piece with barely a minute on the clock, but his goal would ultimately be a footnote in the Miracle of Istanbul, 4:B - Having won a whopping 17 games in a row between October and February, Inter were on course for an invincible season until they slipped to a 3-1 loss to Roma at San Siro in mid-April., 5:C - Kanouté smashed past Jens Lehmann in the 88th minute, giving Spurs a glimmer of hope which was snuffed out almost immediately, 6:D - The Brazilian midfielder had his moments at Old Trafford, but never lived up to his £26m fee, 7:A - Bacca spared Milan further misery during a season in which they limped to seventh in the league, 8:B - It may seem surreal now, but Alisson was limited to Coppa Italia and European appearances for the duration of the 2016-17 campaign, 9:D - Towards the end of Hart’s loan spell, Urbano Cairo, the Torino president, said: “We probably didn’t expect so many mistakes from an England international … but he did some good things, too”, 10:A - With pleasing circularity – unless you’re an Arsenal fan – Sánchez’s final goal in England was against his former club, kickstarting a 3-1 win for United in the FA Cup.

Scores

1. 10 and above.

   Bellissimo!

2. 9 and above.

   You know your Serie A well

3. 8 and above.

   Decent score, that

4. 7 and above.

   Not too shabby

5. 6 and above.

   Moderately better than average

6. 5 and above.

   Fine, average, whatever

7. 4 and above.

   Fine, average, whatever

8. 3 and above.

   Middling

9. 2 and above.

   Bad

10. 0 and above.

    So bad it defies probability

11. 1 and above.

    Shockingly bad