Carlo Ancelotti's Champions League triumph with Real Madrid proves that managers are only as good as the players they work with

It's full-time at the Stade de France, Real Madrid players are running wild celebrating their UEFA Champions League triumph. A white shirt goes sprinting here and another sprinting over there. Carlo Ancelotti stood calm as a cucumber in all this commotion, one eyebrow raised as it always is. It would have been hard for anyone who didn’t already know to guess that he had just become the manager with the most Champions League titles in history.

Not only that, but he had also become only the fourth manager in the illustrious history of Real Madrid to win a League and Champions League double. The cigars were out and they were thoroughly deserved. For Don Carlo, the taste of victory must have been even sweeter.

Even as Real Madrid made their way to this historic achievement, Ancelotti was questioned every step of the way, at every perceived falter. Even the decision to bring him on in the first place came under intense scrutiny from Real Madrid fans. At the time, who could blame them?

The struggles of Don Ancelotti

Ancelotti’s last two jobs prior to his Real Madrid return saw perhaps the darkest period of his managerial career as he struggled at Napoli and to a greater extent at Everton. With the Toffees, Ancelotti initially showed promise as he steadied the ship in his first half-season with the squad.

He took the team from a perilous 15th position in the table to 12th by the end of the season, losing only six times in their last 20 league games compared to the nine losses they suffered in their opening 18 games.

In his first full season at the club, they topped the Premier League table for three weeks, sparking talk of a seventh “big team” in England that could knock one of the established teams off their perch. That talk was short-lived as Everton went on a run of four losses in five games to lose ground on the leading pack.

Their results varied as the season went on and they eventually finished 10th. This was Ancelotti’s lowest finish in a league season and he ended his Everton spell with the lowest points per game average of his career.

Most pundits saw it as him being at the end of his managerial wit. Others, saw a manager struggling to make do with a team with many inadequacies. A team that didn’t have the tools with which he could work his magic.

Real Madrid vs Everton: Mind the gap

To understand the gap in quality between players at the two clubs, you only need to look at Karim Benzema, the enigmatic French forward who led Real Madrid’s charge from the front. He was in supernatural form for Los Blancos and has most likely already sealed a Ballon d’Or. He pillaged 44 goals in 46 games for Madrid last season.

Meanwhile, Everton’s most potent goalscoring duo during Ancelotti’s time at the club, Dominic Calvert-Lewin and Richarlison, managed 49 between them, with Calvert-Lewin’s 21 goals the highest tally in Ancelotti’s only full season at the club.

Then you move to other parts of the squad. The iconic midfield trio of Luka Modric, Toni Kroos, and Casemiro hold sway for the capital club over Everton's Allan, Abdoulaye Doucoure, and Andre Gomes. They, with all due respect, pale in comparison to the Madrid midfielders.

When Ancelotti had to call on his bench to save the day at Real Madrid, players like Marcelo, Marco Asensio, the sensational Eduardo Camavinga, and Rodrygo rescued them on many occasions. At Everton, whenever a key cog was out of action, it was a lottery to find a replacement, and many times he had to make do with what he had.

Liverpool FC v Real Madrid - UEFA Champions League Final 2021/22

Upon further inspection, it’s not so difficult to see why the results differed between the two clubs and it has little to do with Ancelotti’s managerial quality.

Player quality does matter after all

We’ve heard a few top coaches say it: the players make the coach as much as, if not more than, the coaches make the players. It’s hard to have a perfect sample with which to come to a definitive conclusion for all coaches, but for Carlo Ancelotti, it has been obvious that the difference between being perceived as a manager on a downward spiral and a world-class manager at the top of his game has been his ability to call upon players like Modric, Kroos, Benzema, Vinicius Jr., Thibaut Courtois, and Casemiro.

That’s not to say he’s done no work at all, he has. One only needs to look at the form and character of the UCL final winner Vinicius Jr., who has grown in leaps and bounds, to know that a lot of work has gone on in the single season that Ancelotti has been back at the Bernabeu.