Luca D’Angelo, the man before the lord. Pisa enjoys the return of its leader
A coach is not just a man on the pitch: he is a guide, a leader, the direct emanation of what a football club wants to be and tell. The coach is a charismatic figure, a romantic character, who absorbs emotions in the necessary cynicism, an extraordinary thickening of qualities and defects that always makes the difference. He must make a team become a group of individuals: players each with their own very special talent, forced to accept the role that the coach decides of them, a polyphony of nationality and culture, young men who often have left study, friendships, loves, the normal life to get to do the job of their dreams and that they find themselves, absolutely unprepared, very rich and famous. A psychologist, a strategist, a motivator. An actor condemned to play the role of the winner in every club, in every situation, not to end up on the long list of broken promises. It is useless to deny it: he is the most observed, scrutinized, debated, loved and hated figure in the world of football at the same time. He is often polarizing and divisive, even more so in an age when he is overexposed, where the results of his teams seem to depend on every little move or tactical choice.
His style is part of the personality and becomes fundamental in the eternal diatribe between those who choose a well-finished outfit on the bench and those who are satisfied with giving directions in overalls. Already the tracksuit, because in football – as in life unfortunately – we focus on the form and not on the content. The suit implies worker philosophy, it is probably the least elegant item of clothing in circulation, and it is, in its own way, the dress code of the dream coach: Luca D’Angelo. Yes, because the Abruzzo technician is (well) back in Pisa. Arrived in an incredible way and discussed within the top management, after all “September is the month of rethinking about years and age. After the summer it brings the used gift of perplexity, of perplexity. You sit and think and play the game of your identity again. As sparks burn in your fire the possibilities, the possibilities ”. He finds himself having good players, taken one by one, but put together they look like deserters who find themselves by chance under the same roof. They appear tired and seem to know nothing about each other, they look at each other, they cannot love each other, they would like to know each other but no one takes the decisive step towards the other. You bring that grit to a square eager for redemption and you will lose in the catastrophic start of the season.
In the joint press conference with the Directors Chiellini and Corrado for the presentation to the city, he could have sung “here I nail you to those thoughts of yours, those four rags in which you threw yesterday”(As Francesco Guccini remembers here too) instead lifts the veil of honesty, showing you a clear, clean landscape with a clean profile. There are streets and buildings, some climbs. The streets are deserted, no one can be seen on the horizon. D’Angelo simply asks if you want to walk with him, he does not seek the impossible, he moves where he can compete, in this, as concrete as an accountant. He does not promise you anything, he does not know how to predict the future, not even pronounce himself with certainty on the goal to be achieved, on the goal to be conquered. No traps, just the promise of a journey alongside him. Long or short, it is only for that humble prospect that you decide to follow it.
Its strength is silence, accompanied by very few measured, precise, sure and passionate words (“Pisa is for me like Real“).
Hey Siri, please search for “class”.