The entire Atalanta squad is understood to earn less than Neymar ahead of their Champions League quarter-final clash against Paris Saint-Germain.
In their first ever season in Europe’s elite competition, Atalanta have defied the odds by making it out of the group stage and beating Valencia in the last-16.
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On top of that, no team managed to score more goals than Gian Piero Gasperini’s side (98) as they secured a third-placed finish in Serie A.
Atalanta take on moneybags PSG on Wednesday, with the Ligue 1 champions aiming to win a maiden Champions League trophy.
According to French outlet L’Equipe, PSG star Neymar earns £32.5million-a-year.
Meanwhile, Atalanta have the 13th-highest budget in Serie A and the whole squad is believed to earn around £27m-a-year.
Italian outlet La Gazzetta dello Sport claim Atalanta’s highest earners are Alejandro Gomez, Duvan Zapata and Luis Muriel on a base salary of £1.6m.
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Despite their lack of funds, Atalanta are arguably the most exciting team in Europe, PSG boss Thomas Tuchel is aware of Atalanta’s ‘unique’ attacking threat.
He said: “Defending well is going to be very important against Atalanta.
“They have a totally unique style. They attack with all their players, move forward all the time and press everywhere.
“The number 10, [Alejandro] Gomez, is always free to roam. He tries to combine with other players in small spaces.
“They like to play down both sides with very attacking wingers, they put in crosses, but can also hit shots from distance.
“All this means is we have to be very focused in defence and try not to concede, but we know that’s going to be very difficult keeping a clean sheet against Atalanta.”
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Atalanta are based in Bergamo, an Italian city which was devastated by the coronavirus pandemic.
At the time Atalanta progressed to the Champions League quarter-finals in March, an average of 40 people were dying a day in Bergamo.
The city was nicknamed ‘Italy’s Wuhan’, which was a reference to the Chinese province where the coronavirus outbreak started.
Ahead of the resumption of football in June, Gasperini, who recovered from coronavirus earlier this year, insisted ‘Atalanta can help Bergamo start again’.
He said: “Bergamo is suffering from a deep sadness that you can feel everywhere, in the streets, in the eyes of the people, in the bars and in the restaurants, in the silences of my staff member who lost his father.
“Everyone is going forward, with strength but with intense pain. It will take years to fully comprehend what happened here, because this was truly the centre of the hurt.
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“Every time that I think about it, it feels absurd: the historic peak of sporting joy coincided with the city’s greatest pain.
“I’ve been asked many times if it’s right to return. Some consider it ‘amoral’. But I’ve seen people singing from their balconies in Italy while trucks were collecting the dead in Bergamo and I don’t consider that ‘amoral’.
“I consider it an instinctive human reaction, an attempt to embrace life, to react to tragedy.
“Atalanta can help Bergamo start again, after all of the pain and the mourning. The team has always remained connected to Bergamo and its suffering. And we will take it on to the field.”
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