Casting Milan for the bench: who is Marcelo Daniel Gallardo

Marcelo Daniel Gallardo was born in Merlo, in the province of Buenos Aires, on 18 January 1976. He is the coach of Al-Ittihad and in the past played as a midfielder. He wore the shirts of River Plate, Monaco, River Plate again, Paris Saint-Germain, DC United, River Plate again and Nacional. He also has 44 caps for Argentina.

as a coach

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His coaching career began where his career as a footballer ended: at Nacional in Montevideo. He immediately wins the championship and leaves the team. Two years later he was signed by River Plate, with whom he won the Copa Sudamericano and then the Copa Libertadores in 2015, nineteen years after the last time. His time on the River bench is full of successes, including a second Copa Libertadores; the fourteen trophies obtained make him the most successful in the history of the club. The national title arrives in 2021, while in the following season he announces his farewell. So, last November he accepted the proposal of Al-Ittihad in the Saudi Pro League.

how he plays

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Gallardo is not the type of coach who can be pigeonholed into a reference form. The main criterion of his philosophy is the mastery of the game, which is sought in different ways. He prefers a four-man defence, with the midfield that can be arranged in a diamond shape or with two midfielders and a lower apex behind. Stylistically he harks back to Bielsa and asks his teams to always have a very high intensity, useful for an almost ferocious reconquest of the ball. The construction of the bass is a fundamental pillar, the low exteriors have a marked importance both in the maneuver and in the finalization. Possession must be characterized by rapid ball circulation, with the aim of verticalizing early and well. In the past he imposed that the youth teams also played following the same concepts, so as to facilitate the arrival of the promises of tomorrow in the first team.