Spalletti: ”Sabbatical year? Never said, we’ll see in December”. And what a jab at Allegri…

”Naples and the Neapolitans have given me wonderful sensations, no finish line or Scudetto could make them deserve all this joy and enthusiasm. Consequently, I will always have something special for them and I will always defend them”. Luciano Spalletti he breaks the silence and speaks again after his farewell to the new Italian champions, spending sweet words for a team and a city ”to which I will be eternally grateful”.

Spalletti: ”The public drove us”

The now former blue coach was awarded on the occasion of the “Certaldo nel pallano” event, in which the three coaches born in the Tuscan municipality were honored (in addition to Spalletti there were Paolo Indiani and Alberto Ramerini, architects of the promotions respectively of the ‘Arezzo in Serie C and Certaldo himself in D), protagonists of an extraordinary season. It was an opportunity for Spalletti to underline his love for the Neapolitan people, which has remained intact despite the still fresh divorce: ”They have given me so much joy that it is neither in heaven nor on earth. There is no beauty, however great it may be, that can give you back what they gave me. I don’t know what they did to Maradona, it will be a thousand times more, but I imagine what love he received considering how much love I received. We often talked about it with the team in the locker room, the Neapolitans have driven us on the path to the Scudetto”.

The future: “Sabbatical year? Never said”

Inevitable then to address the topic of separation with the blue club. Spalletti returns to the reasons: ”If you love this sport, for which I have influenced my life and my family, at a certain point you have to deal with the level of love you can give and the level of demand there is. Consequently, sometimes, even if you have done very well, you think you may be missing something to give back. Also, I have some personal issues to sort out that need some time. They add up to what I said: I’m tired, I had my family and a distant little daughter, I want to spend some time with her. In ten days the teams will leave and I don’t know with what enthusiasm I would have left if I had still been a Serie A coach or the Napoli coach. They deserve things that I can’t give right now, even if I’m very dedicated and determined”. However, this does not translate into a sabbatical year: ”I never said it – specifies the Tuscan coach – you invented it. I needed to sit still and learn from other coaches. For the moment I’m staying out, around December January or February we’ll look and see if we can have a suitable posture to go back to being a coach in the locker room, where synthesis is needed, making beautiful videos and you need to have new and modern things to to say”.

Stoccata in Allegri

The discussion then goes beyond the Naples argument. Spalletti speaking of modern football does not spare a jab at Massimiliano Allegri, in the midst of the Tuscan derby: ”Everyone can say that football is easy, we need to say something different because we want to choose whether football is easy, that’s enough, or if instead it has to become something modern, as happens in many other professions. I, like many others, want to hear something different: I repeat, that football is easy, everyone can say it. It’s true that it’s easy and in this sense you have to take the things done by people like Vialli, Mancini, Baggio, Del Piero and Totti with you, but then there’s also the work of other players who didn’t have this quality due to the donation of God but they had to get it with day to day work and application. For this we need to explain how those without these qualities managed to make it and if there is more that can be made available to young people. Football needs quality and ever more qualitative things”.

”Me at Juve? Very poor equation”

In just over a month the championship will start again, orphaned by Spalletti who for his part does not see a team more favorite than the others: ”I see the same teams, I see a great desire. Someone has to deprive themselves of some strong players, but it’s normal, it depends on the accounts. There are many strong players around. The important thing is to find the right environment, Naples was exceptional in this. Napoli are starting as one of the contenders for the Scudetto because they have a very strong team and club, but Juventus, Inter and Milan are uncomfortable opponents”. And speaking of Juventus, after the transfer of Cristiano Giuntoli to the bianconeri, there are those who thought that Spalletti could make the same journey: ”It’s an equation for the very poor, for those who have no arguments”, the Tuscan coach cut short before praising his former captain Di Lorenzo: ‘ ‘I often judge a footballer for the character he has. In my opinion it is essential. Clearly it needs to have quality, but a summary needs to be highlighted: the game is an empty box and you have to fill it with things, whoever puts in the most is the best player but you need to be able to stimulate everyone to give a little All. And Di Lorenzo is that extra something that becomes evident when we talk about modern football: Di Lorenzo is modern football”.