SABATINO DURANTE
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BASIC INFORMATIONS
Name: Sabatino Surname: Durante Date Of Birth: April 1955 Place Of Birth: Termoli, Italy Nationality: Italian Main Occupation: FIFA Agent Secondary Occupation: Sport Director Other Occupations: Boxing Promoter and Manager, Responsable of Foreign Relationship of Italian Federation of Clay Pigeon Shooting (Olympic Sport), Licensed Journalist 
Sabatino Durante (in blue) with his represented players Goran Pandev and Ako Stojko
CAREER - SPORT DIRECTOR
Sabatino Durante was the Sport Director of the "Magic Perugia" under the Presidency of Luciano Gaucci. He worked there between the end of 90' and the first years of 2000. When he started to work with Perugia, the club was in Serie B and they were looking to get the promotion in Serie A. In the Season 1995-1996 he choosed Giovanni Galeone as Coach of the Team, buildt a team that was dragged by the captain Federico Giunti and Marco Negri's goals to the promotion in Serie A. After a long duel in the last part of the championship with Salernitana, the penalty kick transformed by Massimiliano Allegri (who became years later the famous AC Milan and Juventus coach), was decisive to win the Serie B Title. In that season Sabatino Durante sold a young Gennaro Gattuso to Glasgow Rangers to get the cash to build a team for Serie A. 
Italian Sport Journal talk about Milan Rapaic and Sabatino Durante (in the background of the first picture on the left in the article).
Sabatino Durante (on the right) with Hidetoshi Nakata at his presentation press conference in Perugia. In the picture also Giovanni Trapattoni (Milan, Juventus, Inter, Bayern Munchen, Italy)
Sabatino Durante joking about the omnipresent picture of his player Hidetoshi Nakata during the World Cup of Japan and Korea in 2002.
Sabatino Durante hosted in an Italian Football TV Program "La Domenica Sportiva"
In the summer of 2000 Luciano Gaucci and Sabatino Durante decided to make big changes in the team. They decided to give the team to the Perugian Coach Serse Cosmi, who just had so far made himself known for having brought the Arezzo from Serie D to the C1 but who still had no experience in the major categories. To this change followed a dismantling of the first eleven team with the sale of the best elements of the squad. The few remaining players such as the goalkeeper Andrea Mazzantini, the captain Marco Materazzi and the Brazilian Zé Maria, were joined by a top scouting work of Sabatino Durante that signed young and promising Italians players found in the lower Italian categories, such as Davide Baiocco, Manuele Blasi, Marco Di Loreto, Fabio Liverani (actually Coach of Lecce in Serie A) and Mirko Pieri, and foreigners from all over the planet, above all the Greek striker Zīsīs Vryzas.
In spite of the preconditions that were seeing Perugia as the sacrificial victim of the championship, the renewed Perugia immediately proposed a strong and entertaining style of play and, more importantly, strong results. Perugia were ranked in the tenth place in 2000-2001, establishing themselves as the surprise of a tournament in which Materazzi above all emerged, despite his role of Centre Back, becoming the team's top scorer, scoring 12 goals - setting the record, for a defender, in a single vintage of the Italian top division. In the 2001-2002 championship, Perugia buildt and expose the still unknown Fabio Grosso, future Italian "hero" at the 2006 World Cup in Germany; in that season the club improved his ranking in the eighth place. The following year Sabatino Durante buildt another talent that in the next years made his name at the Top of Italian Football, Fabrizio Miccoli. |
CAREER - FIFA AGENT
Sabatino Durante is one of the most succesful and effective FIFA Agent of the last 30 years in the World of Football. He was the Agent who dealed Ronaldo Nazario da Lima (El Fenomeno) to Inter in 1997, the Agent who moved Luka Modric from Tottenham to Real Madrid in 2012, Lucas Moura to PSG in 2013 and in Tottenham in 2018; Coutinho, Maicon, Julio Cesar and Lucio in the Inter of the "Triplete" with Jose Mourinho, Gabigol to Inter, Jerry Mina to Barcellona. He also represented players like Gennaro Gattuso, Marco Materazzi, Hidetoshi Nakata, Milan Rapaic, Goran Pandev and many others. He was the founder of the Intermediation and Management Agency Stellar Football with David Manasseh and Jonathan Barnet (Gareth Bale, Saul Niguez, Ashley Cole, Peter Crouch). He was also the Agent of Coach Rafa Benitez when he moved to Inter and Napoli, the Agent of Gianluca Petrachi (now Sport Director of AS Roma), Serse Cosmi (Coach of Perugia) and many other top names of Italian and International Football. 
Sabatino Durante (in blue) with Perugia's Chairman, Luciano Gaucci.
Serie A dream lasted just twelve months: at the end of a championship conducted positively in the first part of the season but soon channeled into the brawl of the relegation area in the second part, marked by the firing of Galleon in favor of Nevio Scala, the team had been relegated in the last game. After that season Marco Negri was sold to Glasgow Rangers, where he became one of the best player of the history of the Scottish Club with a record of 33 goals in 30 games.
Back in Serie B, Perugia regained the highest category of Serie A with Sabatino Durante choosing Ilario Castagner as Coach. Among the protagonists of the prompt ascent together with captain Salvatore Matrecano, the midfield couple Antonio Manicone-Renato Olive, emerged the Croatian Striker Milan RapaiC. Perugia remained in the top category for six seasons this time. In 1998-1999 the Umbrian team, led by Castagner and then by the Yugoslavian Vujadin Boškov, achieved salvation by ranking in fourteenth place and qualifying for the Intertoto Cup (Europe League Qualifications). Rapaić definitely came out together with the newcomer Hidetoshi Nakata, both signed by Sabatino Durante and very loved by the fans: in particular the Japanese midfielder, who landed in Italy bringing some perplexities for his strange charachter very shy and composed, made his debut with a superb performance against Juventus, then he established himself in the following months between the revelations of the tournament; with his performances, the Japanese playmaker soon became a media phenomenon on a global level becoming the only player, in the entire history of Perugia, gaining the candidacy for the Golden Ball, in the editions of 1998 and 1999. In the 1999-2000 vintage the team was entrusted to Carlo Mazzone, who took it without worries to the tenth final place; on the last day the red and white were also decisive in the scudetto race because, exactly as happened twenty-four years earlier, they beated Juventus 1-0 in a home game, this time with a goal by Alessandro Calori, removing the possibility of Juventus to win a title that was won by Lazio. In Intertoto (Europe League Qualifications) the Umbrians instead came out in the third round after a suspension suffered in the return match with the Turks of Trabzonspor, thus frustrating the success of the first leg. 
Sabatino Durante together with Perugia coach Serse Cosmi
Sabatino's player Marco Materazzi, Top Scorer of Perugia with 12 goals in 00/01
Sabatino Durante moved Fabio Grosso from the position of Nr.10 to the left back, where years later he won the World Cup with Italy
Fabrizio Miccoli with Perugia
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BOXING AND CLAY PIGEON SHOOTING
Sabatino Durante was the Manager and the Promoter of the Italian Boxeur Giovanni Parisi. He helped Parisi in win the Olympic Gold Medal in Seoul in 1988 and the World Champion Title WBO in the light weight category in 1992. He organized with Don King, the famous American Boxing Promoter, the match between Giovanni Parisi and Julio Cesar Chavez in Las Vegas in 1995. Sabatino Durante with Giovanni Parisi
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He was also the Manager and the Promoter of the Italian Boxeur from Assisi (village close to Perugia) Gianfranco Rosi. With him, Rosi won the World Champion Title IBF in the superwelther weight category in 1988 in Atlantic City.
Sabatino Durante between Gianfranco Rosi and Marvin Hagler
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Sabatino is also a passionate Clay Pigeon Shooting fan, he became member of the Italian Federation with the responsability of covering the Foreign Relationship whilst he works also as journalist for main international events. During his career in this Sport, Italian Athletes won several medals. He was with Italian Team during all the Olympics Games of the last 20 years. He used, when he was Sport Director of Perugia, to bring the team to have shooting experiences. Thanks to this sport he became close friend of one of the richest man in the World, the Sultan of Brunei Haji Sufri Bolkiah..
Sabatino Durante with Sultan of Brunei Haji Sufri Bolkiah
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Sabatino Durante represented, promoted and influenced the career of several athlethes who won the most important awards in their sport, such as:
Ronaldo Nazario da Lima - World Cup 2002, Golden Ball 1997, 2002
Luka Modric - Golden Ball 2018
Marco Materazzi, Fabio Grosso, Gennaro Gattuso - World Cup 2006
Maicon, Julio Cesar, Lucio - "Triplete 2010", Champions League 2010
Gianfranco Rosi - World Champion IBF 1988
Giovanni Parisi - World Champion WBO 1992
Clay Pigeon Shooting (Olympic Games)
Ronaldo Nazario da Lima - World Cup 2002, Golden Ball 1997, 2002
Luka Modric - Golden Ball 2018
Marco Materazzi, Fabio Grosso, Gennaro Gattuso - World Cup 2006
Maicon, Julio Cesar, Lucio - "Triplete 2010", Champions League 2010
Gianfranco Rosi - World Champion IBF 1988
Giovanni Parisi - World Champion WBO 1992
Clay Pigeon Shooting (Olympic Games)
Sabatino Durante (with the ball) Charity Game - 1992. With him Italian Champions of the World former players like Ciccio Graziani, Franco Causio and Claudio Gentile. Also former players Salvatore Bagni, Mauro Bellugi, Maurizio Marchei, Claudio Tinaglia, Graziano Vinti and Franco Vannini. Former Coach Gianni Di Marzio and Italian Journalist Carlo Valentini
INTERVIEWS
