On Wednesday, Aurelio De Laurentiis announced the appointment of Mauro Meluso as the club’s new Sporting Director. After the appointment of Rudi Garcia as Coach, the De Laurentiis once again caught the general public off guard, after rumours surfaced that the Napoli president was in discussions with former Milan Sporting Director Ricky Massara.
Meluso, who has been inactive for two seasons, last worked at Spezia, where in a single season he signed Kevin Agudelo, Julian Chabot, Alessandro Deiola, Nahuel Estévez, Diego Farias, Ardian Ismajli, M’Bala Nzola, Roberto Piccoli, Tommaso Pobega, Ivan Provedel, Jacopo Sala, Daniele Verde and Jeroen Zoet.
Prior to that, Meluso spent four seasons at Lecce, culminating in promotion to Serie A. During his time in Apulia, Meluso built a squad including the likes of Khouma Babacar, Panagiotis Tachtsidis, Gianluca Lapadula, Antonin Barak, Riccardo Saponara and Andrea La Mantia.
Napoli is the highest profile role for the Calabrian, who gradually progressed through the ranks. Meluso previously worked at Foggia, Padua, Pisa, Sangiovannese, Teramo, Ternana, Frosinone and Cosenza.
