What next for Ferguson after Coppa Italia heroics?

Ferguson has starred since moving to Italy in 2022, earning the club captaincy a year later, and being named Serie A midfielder of the season for 2023-24.

He has also endured hardship.

Leaving aside the challenges of living and playing overseas, Ferguson missed over 200 days of football after injuring knee ligaments in April 2024, and a hamstring problem threatened to rule him out of Wednesday’s final.

“All those difficult times throughout the last year dealing with the injury, all that hard work was worth it when I lifted the trophy,” he said.

“I’d never played outside of Scotland before so to move to a new country and have the people here welcome you, you want to pay them back with nights like Wednesday.

“To see them turn out in their numbers, we walked out on the pitch before the game just to have a little look around and the Bologna end was already full, they were already singing, the flags were everywhere. It gave me goosebumps.

“To see their faces at the end when the referee blew the final whistle was amazing.

“So many people in tears, people jumping about celebrating, something they’ve not seen in such a long time. The relationship between the players and fans is incredible.”