Who is Paolo Vanoli.

He won the UEFA Cup in Moscow, helped Conte, coached future European champions. What you need to know about a potential Spartak coach

First, the input. As it became known to SE from sources in Italy, in case of replacing Rui Vitoria in the first part of the season, the red-whites are in contact with Paolo Vanoli, who worked for a long time as one of Antonio Conte's assistants. Similar information has already appeared in social networks. Conte has now led Tottenham, but Vanoli has not been included in his headquarters.

We are talking about an appointment in January. At the same time, the candidacy of a 49-year-old specialist, with whom several more coaches from the Apennines may arrive in the Russian capital, is being lobbied not by Franco Camozzi, who is close to the shareholders of the Moscow club, but by the well-known agent Andrea d'Amico. Recently, Vanoli has been conducting consultations related to the employment option at Spartak.

“Spoke with Paolo this morning. We didn’t discuss football matters, we talked about the family. I never get into my brother's work, I don't give any advice. But I have never heard anything about Russia. But he talked about Tottenham. Antonio Conte is getting married there, and his brother worked with him, ”said in an interview with SE immediately after the very first information about the interest of the red-and-whites, the coach’s brother, Rodolfo Vanoli, who is now working in Slovenia.

On this day in 1999 @ParmaCalcio_en won their second UEFA Cup, and fourth European trophy, defeating Marseille 3-0 thanks to goals from @SaoPauloFC_eng manager Hernan @Crespo and @Inter_en assistant coach Paolo Vanoli. . What a star studded line-up! #Parma #UEFACup #SerieA pic.twitter.com/6ia6sYlbPa

— The Gentleman Ultra (@GentlemanUltra) May 13, 2021

Doesn't it remind you of something? Massimo Carrera also worked with Conte, but at Chelsea the coach was allowed to take on a limited number of assistants, and the future head coach of the red and white turned out to be superfluous. At the same time, as Conte later said, he recommended Carrera to the post of head coach of the Italian national team, but he, having no experience of independent work, refused. And then the legendary story of Spartak's triumph happened.

Moscow final

Born in Varese, Vanoli, 49, is a former footballer who had one of the highlights of his career in Moscow. We are talking about the 1999 UEFA Cup final, which was crowned with a confident victory for Parma over Marseille. Then, under the leadership of Alberto Malesani, a real constellation gathered with Gianluigi Buffon, Lilian Thuram, Fabio Cannavaro, Juan Sebastian Veron, Enrico Chiesa and Hernan Crespo.

To understand the depth of the composition of that team, suffice it to say that Abel Balbo and Faustino Asprilla started the Moscow final on the bench. But Vanoli was on the field, who could play on the left both in the middle line and in defense. And the second goal of Parma is on his account. Paolo is even somewhat unique, because in the same season he scored a goal in the won final of the Coppa Italia, and a year later in the same tournament – after moving to Fiorentina – he knocked out his former teammates with a winning blow on the 87th minute.

Belgium beat Italy 3-1 in a friendly in 1999. Paolo Vanoli scored the Italy goal. what a strike! #BELITA pic.twitter.com/HNEYNsyWdn

— Football Remind (@FootballRemind) July 2, 2021

At the same time, Vanoli was not a star. The three mentioned trophies and the Italian Super Cup are the whole collection of prizes. Vanoli has two matches for Italy. Before Euro 2000, in a test meeting, he made his debut with a goal against Belgium, but there was no continuation in the Dino Zoff team. In the last years of his career, Paolo tried himself abroad – at the Rangers, where he scored a curious own goal, and at the Greek Atromitos, and after finishing playing, he devoted himself to coaching.

Defense Specialist

Most of Vanoli's coaching career has been with the national teams, where he started as an assistant with the U-16 team. The specialist progressively moved up to the U-19 squad, having tried himself both as an assistant and as a head coach. In 2013, Paolo was part of the staff of Daniele Zorrato and in the final of the European Championship U-17 lost in a penalty shootout to the Russian team led by Dmitry Khomukha. Golovin, Barinov, Zhemaletdinov and Mitryushkin he remembered exactly.

The peak of Vanoli's career at youth level as head coach was the U-19 European Championship final in 2016. Then in the group Italy left behind the hosts of the tournament the Germans, in the semi-finals they passed England, but in the battle for the title they were defeated by France with Kylian Mbappe (0:4). In that Vanoli team, which played in a 4-4-2 formation with two defensive players, future Euro 2020 winners Nicolo Barella and Manuel Locatelli were in charge of the center of the field.

Then the coach was called to the main Italian team, led by Gian Piero Ventura. And a year later, an invitation came from London, where Antonio Conte, who won the league title with Chelsea, received a new contract and the opportunity to expand his staff. In London, Vanoli was an assistant to the chief, and already at Inter he received a position that, according to Transfermarkt, was officially called coach for the development of technology.

True, the English media, remembering Paolo before the recent appointment of Conte to Tottenham, unanimously noted the role of an assistant in building a game in defense. Vanoli himself spoke about this when Inter, for which he had been rooting since childhood, after winning the Scudetto, held a special press conference to celebrate the contribution of members of Conte's headquarters.

Former Rangers defender Paolo Vanoli joins Antonio Conte's Inter staffhttps://t.co/DhtBrQx4wp pic.twitter.com/isfbvE0EtF

— Football Scotland (@Football_Scot) July 8, 2019

“The beauty of this work is in the debate,” Vanoli admitted at the time. – There are always some discussions between the members of the coaching staff. My job is to monitor the defense phase: I need to improve people. Playing back three is not easy, you have to learn a lot of concepts. Our goal is to teach everyone the same. The greatest satisfaction comes when players come out who may not have played that much and play very well.”

If you project these phrases, as well as Vanoli's biography on Spartak, you get an interesting option. A specialist who knows how to work with young people and develop footballers, and who also knows the game of three central defenders thoroughly.The scheme with which Domenico Tedesko worked and to which Rui Vitoria comes from the selection of performers. The third central midfielder against Lester and two players in the attack are the last touch. Perhaps, the restructuring will allow the Portuguese to bring red and white out of the crisis and work out the segment that remained until the end of the year so that the topic of resignation will fad in the background. But if everything is bad, the Italian candidate is already available.