Ferrari began his footballing career with local club
Alessandria in the
prima divisione nazionale in 1923. He was at the start of the newly established
Serie A in the season 1929-30, aside from a brief loan to
Napoli during the
1925–26 season, where he scored an impressive 16 goals in 15 matches. He was given credit over a seven-year period (1923–1930) with
Alessandria and
Napoli in total to play in 137 matches and score 78 goals. The following year, Ferrari changed over to
Juventus and was handed the
number 10 shirt. Over that five-year period (1930–1935), which was his first spell at
Juventus, he played in 160 games and scored 66 goals, in addition to providing many
assists. Although the official number of assists he provided went unrecorded, it was said to be extremely high. Ferrari would next move to
Inter, where he would play for five-years (1935-1940), and then subsequently to
Bologna for the
1940–41 season, before return for second spell to
Juventus in the
1941–42 season, this time as a player-manager in what turned out to be the final season of his playing career, winning his 10th major national trophy. After the
Second World War, when Italian club football resumed in the season 1945-46, he became a full-time manager for
Brescia. '''1930-1935: Il Quinquennio d'Oro della Juventus'''
Juventus had won 2 Italian Championships earlier in history, before it was named
Serie A, but under his guidance, the club won 5 consecutive
Serie A Titles, ''Il Quinquennio d'Oro'', by then a record of 1st 5 successive titles ever in Italy, which meant he in reality dragged
Juventus into an era, as one of Italy’s biggest and most important clubs.
1935-1941: Making it a record 8 Serie A titles He then went on to win 2 more
Serie A titles & 1
Coppa Italia with
Internazionale and 1
Serie A title with
Bologna; Making him the first player to win a then record of 8
Serie A Championships,
Virginio Rosetta also won 8 national championships, but 3 of them came before the formation of a professional Serie A. Ferrari is also one of six footballers to have won the Serie A title with 3 clubs, a feat he managed with Juventus, Inter, and Bologna; the other 5 players to have managed the same feat are Filippo Cavalli,
Aldo Serena,
Pietro Fanna,
Sergio Gori, and
Attilio Lombardo. The record for most
Serie A titles went unbroken for 77 years, until the season
2017-18 where
Gianluigi Buffon won his 9th
Serie A title, subsequently making it 10
Serie A titles in the season
2019-20, all 10 titles won with
Juventus.
1941-1942: 2nd spell at Juventus & 10th major national trophy He came back to
Juventus, where he won his 2nd
Coppa Italia, which was his 10th major national trophy in what would be his last season as a player. After this season, the
Serie A &
Coppa Italia were discontinued due to the
Second World War. ==International career==