After winning a play-off, they were back in Serie A for 1987–88 and enjoyed a four-year stay, being obdurate enough to just avoid relegation in this time.

With players such as Alessandro Teodorani, Emiliano Salvetti, Luigi Piangerelli, Aldo Dolcetti, and Dario Hübner, this was a team of considerable ability.

They finished level on points with Padova, however, and lost a promotion play-off which would be a bitter blow for the club, who would suffer relegation to Serie C1 in 1997.

Cesena's first campaign in Serie C1, now rebranded Lega Pro Prima Divisione, started with former Foligno boss Pierpaolo Bisoli as new head coach.

Throughout the season, Cesena quickly emerged as major contenders for direct promotion, and managed to take first place in the league on Week 33, with only one game remaining and a two-point advantage to challengers Pro Patria.

[8] Despite the financial difficulties, Cesena won promotion back to Serie A on 18 June 2014, winning Latina in playoffs in 4–2 aggregate.

Financially, Cesena had another year of negative EBITDA in 2013–14 season, for about €11 million, if excluding windfall profit from player trading from the calculation.

[15][16][17] The prosecutor request to penalize Cesena for up to 15 points,[18] accusing the price tag in the deals were inflated.

An appeal to a department of Italian National Olympic Committee, stating the point deduction should be applied to 2017–18 season, causing Virtus Entella, which originally relegated in 2017–18 Serie B season, made another appeal to Tribunale Amministrativo Regionale del Lazio, for re-admission back to 2018–19 Serie B.