There are still those who are surprised at the end of the game Spalletti gets annoyed and gets angry after hearing an unwelcome judgment or a question that wasn’t intended to be provocative. Yet it is enough to know him, or to have seen him several times on TV, to know that sometimes he does not respond to the interviewer, but to others and he had difficulty keeping to himself what was told to him. He says to son in law why father in law understands. And there are those who like to repeatedly underline an aspect of Luciano’s character that he has never managed to correct and I don’t see how he can do it at 65 years old and why he should: he sees shadows even where there are none, he has a marked propensity for controlling men, situations, environment. He brings you before his nature in all his nakedness. Spalletti has always been like this, he is still the one of the little mice, of the snipers on Trigoria, of the goalkeepers and of the two-legged ones. It’s the poison he confesses to injecting himself with.
On Monday evening he went from hell to heaven in the space of a few seconds: it was inevitable that he took his foot off the brake and let himself go downhill, releasing instinct and intolerance. Finally, there are those who claim that the coach’s anxiety is infecting the Azzurri. It is possible that it conditions someone, the most fragile or the least fit, but above all that it stimulates others – the passage to the round of 16 with a team with obvious defects in technique and personality is a real feat. For almost a year, Spalletti has been in a new outfit and another world: for those who, like him, grew up with the myth of the national team, the fact of being able to lead it to the European Championship represents the highest and most engaging point of his career. Never been a Spallettian. I have always recognized his extraordinary coaching skills, but also his not exactly easy character, full of emotional contortions.
I imagine it wasn’t easy to reinvent himself as a national team selector for a professional who has worked all his life with clubs trying to create a group, shaping it day after day and trying to get into the heads of the players. But he is trying his hardest, challenging himself and even saying things that he should avoid. For example this: «Spain’s gaming dominance? You have to make a running team, which doesn’t dribble, and give the ball into the hands of the opponents. It’s not a type of football that I really like playing, it’s difficult for me to teach it, I’m the least suitable person to do that“. Too honest but disconcerting, said by a coach. And about the hypothetical pact with the players: “Anyone who talks about locker room things does harm to the national team». Always addressing the person who asked the question: «How old is she? 51? I’m 65, she still has 14 years of blowjobs left to reach my experience… She says it because that’s what they told her. I talk to the players, what’s the problem?». Apologies in the night. Spalletti sometimes seems delirious, but instead he is genuine, logical, even elementary: he is the original. When if you decide to take the package Luciano you have to be able to shoulder it in full. Keeping all the good, which is a lot, but also the less good.
