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hour, in his inimitable accent: “Ragassi—boyz—you have to do your best to play like them. Maifredi’s Bologna F. C. is the best team in soccer.” At first, van Basten always had the same reaction: “Manfredo? Who is this Manfredo?” He was accustomed to Ajax, coached by Johan Cruyff. That Sacchi showed Baresi videotapes of Gianluca Signorini, so he could copy his movements, is an historical travesty; that he relentlessly and tirelessly talked to us about “Bologna di Manfredo” is, on the other hand, a sad and undeniable fact. He had managed to make us hate a team we had no reason on earth to hate. The team of the legendary Renato Villa and all the rest. He was jerking our chain. Until finally, one day, justice was done. On 26 December 1987, Sacchi arranged an exhibition match with Bologna, an away game. We poured onto the field, our eyes bloodshot with fury, and I was angrier than anyone else, because that was St. Stephens Day, and there’s an especially lavish banquet that I was being forced to miss. My dear Bologna and my dear Manfredo, I’m going to serve you a bowl of lentils and a plate of bollito to go with it. Before we left the locker room, we made it very clear to Sacchi exactly what was about to happen: “We’ll show you who knows how to play soccer and who doesn’t.”

We pasted them, 5–0. We caned them mercilessly. Van Basten—the player who was most resistant to the playbook, because he loved to play by instinct—was injured, but on the way back home he turned strangely ironic: “Coach, maybe Sacchi’s A. C. Milan is better than Maifredi’s Bologna F. C.” He was happy, even if he was wrong.

One exhibition game made us stronger, then Arrigo took care of the rest. Before he asked us to do something, he always explained why. There was a reason for everything. We implemented an all-encompassing pressing, and our opponents didn’t know which way to turn. They couldn’t understand a thing. They tried to play their game the way they were accustomed, and we suffocated them with our inescapable defense. In comparison with Roma, we were a very different group of players: we were less playful, we were a little more aloof.

The second match that changed our lives was the one we played against Napoli, at the Stadio San Paolo, in the last few weeks of the 1987–88 championship season. We were one point apart in the league, but we knew that there had been an earthquake in their locker room. Seismic tremors that made us confident of victory, in part because we had just won our derby—the Derby della Madonnina against Inter. Even before we ran out onto the field, we knew the game would end with us many points ahead, just as our opponents knew in advance that they were going to lose.

We were hurtling downhill through the championship, and at the bottom of the hill the Scudetto awaited us. Diego Maradona had issued clear orders: “When I play, I don’t want to see a single black-and-red banner in the stadium.” But we were there, and we were stronger than banners and fans. Napoli 2–A. C. Milan 3; we’re the ones, we’re the ones, we’re the champions of Italy. We, and Him. Meanwhile, van Basten pestered a steward: “Excuse me, have you seen Manfredo, by any chance?”

CHAPTER 11

I Decide the Formation.

Sacchi doctored the results of my athletic trials, especially my times on thirty-meter sprints. He didn’t want me to know how bad they were; in his way, he was trying to boost my morale. Let’s put it this way: in a race, a cement traffic post could probably beat me. Two-man sprint? I’d come in third—a distant third.

I was slow, but that’s actually why we won the Italian championship. I couldn’t perform any overlapping plays with Ruud Gullit; that was really the point. Ruud was a missile, I was a crawfish. A blowfish trying to keep up with a barracuda, which is physically impossible. And yet, in the early days, Sacchi believed in this formation, and he would insist on our playing in a 4-3-3 formation on the pitch. Four defenders, three midfielders—me on the right (with His approval), Bortolazzi in the middle, and Donadoni on the left—then three strikers,