Carlo Ancelotti_ The Beautiful Games of an Ordinary Genius - Alessandro Alciato [29]
“Come on what? Dreadlocks here runs three times as fast as me. I couldn’t keep up with him on my motorcycle.”
We tried it forward, backward, and sideways, until Arrigo finally gave up: “Boys, let’s try a 4-4-2 formation. With Ruud as striker and Carletto central midfielder.” To put it simply, that was the formation that won us the Scudetto—the Italian championship. Just for starters. And it was all due to my two wooden legs.
People thought of that A. C. Milan as a remarkably talented team. Well, that’s obviously not true; Roberto Colombo was one of our players … We had a good goalkeeper, Galli, but there were only three genuine thoroughbreds: Baresi, Gullit, and Donadoni, and all three of them were quite young. Maldini was still just a youngster, a phenomenon waiting to be discovered. What really made the difference for that team was our sense of being a group, and a strong sense of belonging, of loyalty. Loyalty to the team, to the owners, to our colors. Credit was due to the youth program, where many of the players had grown up. Galli, Costacurta, Baresi, Maldini, and Evani, lifelong Milan fans—footballers who had learned to walk at Milanello.
A. C. Milan, “The Invincibles,” a homegrown team, with a defense that endured for many years. We could say that it still endures today. Tassotti-Baresi-Costacurta-Maldini—it could have been worse. It’s a legend that is constantly evolving, handed down from year to year, from generation to generation, from symbol to symbol. Gattuso and Ambrosini will be the next lead tenors, if the mass hallucinations of the market will allow it.
Over the past twenty years, A. C. Milan has been consistently victorious because it has managed to preserve the same spirit it had at the beginning. With a deeply Italian core, another fundamental aspect of the team: players who lead the others, taking them to another level, with their behavior, discipline, and character. Foreigners included. There are always five or six Italians, and their presence is crucial; it is thanks to them that the tradition that Sacchi built continues. How long it will endure, I truly cannot say. Everything changes, everything always becomes more challenging. Over the past twenty years, the chairman has remained the same person, the managing director has remained the same person, the team manager has pretty much remained the same, in the sense that Silvano Ramaccioni was replaced only recently. There hasn’t even been much turnover among the cooks and waiters at Milanello. It’s always been a family business. The only significant change is that, because of his political obligations, Berlusconi has been less involved. His absence has been noted. He is rarely present at Milanello; during my last season, there were only occasional phone conversations about specific issues. From time to time, he’d call to ask how the players were doing, what formations I planned to field.
Note to the outside world: I decide on the formations—I alone, in all cases—and I want to make that point clear once and for all. Of course, Berlusconi has asked me more than once to explain why I excluded this player rather than that one, and we may even have argued in some cases when I chose to sideline one or another of his favorites, talented and skilled players that he has a hard time seeing cooling their heels on the bench. Lately, Ronaldinho; in the past, Rui Costa. He loved van Basten and Savicevic; he adores Kaká, even though he decided at a certain point to sell his contract.
If the