“Habemus Campionem”. Thus the Italian sports magazine Guerin Sportivo defined in 1983, a 23 -year -old who was returning to the fields after a serious knee injury that prevented him from being world champion in the 1982 World Cup. It was just one of Carlo Ancelotti’s career, who now has the mission of running around the most feared team on the planet.
When it becomes a coach, a former player is always influenced by the examples he had throughout his career. There was no shortage of models for Ancelotti: Cesare Maldini, Enzo Bearzot, Nils Liedholm, Arrigo Sacchi, masters who marked an epoch in Italian football.
From very different styles – defensive Bearzot to the glowing Sacchi – they seem to have turned Anchelotti into a disciple capable of adapting the scheme of their teams to the characteristics of the players they have.
Ancelotti played in only three clubs, Parma, Rome and Milan, as well as the Italian team. But two of them were mythical teams, Roma de Falcão, in the early 1980s, and Milan de Baresi, Paolo Maldini (son of Cesare), Gullit and Van Basten, at the end of the same decade and the beginning of the following.
Since the beginning of his career, in Parma, then in Serie B, Ancelotti has stood out for his tactical intelligence. It started as a center forward, but gradually retreated to midfield, where its game view was more useful. In the Italian national team, he played 26 times and scored only one goal in the Uruguay in 1981 against the Netherlands.
As soon as he stopped playing in 1992 at the age of 33, Ancelotti became Sacchi’s assistant in Italy. He watched from the reserve bench to painful defeat on penalties for Brazil in the 1994 World Cup decision. He could have succeeded Sacchi, but he opted for his career in clubs and never trained a national team.
A little luck helped. In 1996, Ancelotti took over the club that revealed him, Parma, in the richest phase of his history, with the millions of the Parmalat dairy giant. The 1997 Italian runner-up to this day is the best result in the club’s history.
In the beginning, Ancelotti was adept at a rigid 4-4-2. “Before Milan, he was less open to tactical innovations; Over time, however, he evolved,” says Paolo Maldini, one of his best friends, in an Ancelotti autobiography published in 2009.
At the request of the Almighty Milan Mandate, Silvio Berlusconi-with those who had a troubled relationship-“Carletto” naturally ended up in the “Rossoneri” in 2001. In eight years, he won two Champions League, with teams full of Brazilian players such as Kaka, Rivaldo, Dida, Cafu, Serginho and Roque Junior.
From then on, Ancelotti began to belong to the rarefit of top coaches, who run through the richest clubs in Europe, where national titles are obligation and the main objective is Champions: Chelsea (2009-2011), Paris Saint-Germain (2011-2013), Real Madrid (2013-2015), Bayern Munich (2016-2017).
During this period, however, Champions only came once, in 2014, in a celebrated final that the Real lost to the Madrid Atletico rival until the 47th of the second half.
In 2021, when Ancelotti’s career seemed to have taken the course of the second European level-Napoli (2018-2019) and Everton (2019-2021)-Real Madrid needed a substitute for Zinédine Zidane. Don Carlo’s second pass at Santiago Bernabéu was even more victorious than the first: 15 trophies in four years, including the 2023 and 2024 Champions.
In the accustomed evil Real Madrid, however, a few months without titles are enough to wear out a coach, and since last year, the parties have given signs of the end of the relationship.
Meanwhile, Xabi Alonso, former Real player, was emerging with a great job ahead of Bayer Leverkusen, and Spanish club president Florentino Pérez didn’t want to lose him to another team.
Add to this the confidence crisis of Brazilian football, which began in the 7th to the 2014 World Cup and which killed national coaches, seen as outdated. The invasion of foreign technicians has made the previously unthinkable, a gringo in charge of the national team.
This astral conjunction was almost fruit in 2024, when Ancelotti was very close to a formal agreement. A number of factors – early -press validity, the good results of the real, the fear that the coach’s family felt of crime in Brazil – melted the official announcement.
The bad results of the real and the national team in 2025 revived the hypothesis of a happy ending. After a negotiation start marked by new leaks, which almost put it all down again, the stars began to align: Real Madrid lost the Champions, the King’s Cup and – most likely – the Spanish League. CBF fired Dorival Júnior. The negotiations were conducted with a little more discretion, and after confirmations and denials, finally came the “Yes”.
This week, Brazil’s technical coordinator, former defender Juan Santos, and executive coordinator Rodrigo Caetano will be in Madrid to start work with Ancelotti, who officially assumes within two weeks. The Italian should move to Rio de Janeiro, one of the main questions during the negotiation.
One of the most gossiping issues will be your relationship with the stars of the national team. Throughout her club coach career, Ancelotti dealt with almost all the great Brazilian stars of the last 20 years, usually leaving good memories.
At Real Madrid, he knew how to turn Vinicius Jr. from an erratic dribbler into a fearsome leader. With Endrick, however, the results were not so convincing, and at times the Italian spared no criticism of his young reserve. In charge of Brazil, Ancelotti will have to deal with both and resolve other issues, such as the role of a veteran Neymar and solutions to the sides, once the strength and today the weak link of the Brazilian team.
