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In Sportskeeda’s exclusive “Top 10 European Managers of the Season”, let’s take a look at the Number 8 on the list.
Read #9 in the Managers’ Series here (Stay tuned on www.Sportskeeda.com, Each day a new manager)
#8: Walter Mazzarri
“Is Mazzarri my [Jose] Mourinho? He’s much better than the Inter coach,“ said Aurelio De Laurentiis, the Napoli supremo. I wanted to start off with this quote, not to show how Napoli’s president, an Italian film producer, is so dramatic but how great the gravity of the comparison is. You don’t easily compare someone with Jose Mourinho and certainly not tell that he is better than “Special One”, for Jose Mourinho is a benchmark on which football managers are compared with these days. But there is something about Walter Mazzarri that makes this comparison worthy, for it is not for nothing that he is #8 on Sportskeeda’s Top 10 European Football Managers of the Season. Even the most hard core anti-Napoli fan will dare not disagree with the ranking, for that is the enormity of Mazzarri’s achievements this season with the Naples club.
Walter Mazzarri, a product of the Fiorentina youth system, made his professional debut for Pescara, spending much of his playing career in Empoli before retiring in 1995. His coaching days, interestingly, began at Napoli where he was the assistant coach for the club under Renzo Ulivieri for the 1998 season, at the very same club with whom he would go on to make history a decade later. Mazzarri got thrust into the limelight when he saved Reggina stay afloat in the Serie A for three consecutive seasons, most notably in 2006-07 season when they were doomed with a 11 point deduction. He then went to Sampdoria where he had a decent stint that included a 3-1 rout of Inter in Coppa Italia semi-final(when Jose was Inter’s coach) and finally on 6th October 2009, he replaced Roberto Donadoni as the manager of Napoli.
Mazzarri helped end a 21 year old wait and made the dreams of Neapolitans come true
Remember the words of De Laurentiis that I quoted? The interesting fact about them is that those words were not said by Napoli’s President after their historic qualification to the Champions league this season that ended a 21 year long wait, but way back on November 1st, 2009 when Napoli came back from 2 goals down against Juventus to win 3-2. Napoli’s President then expected a Europa league qualification and said about the UCL, “The Champions League? I’m not even thinking about it, because to get there you need a precise programme, important purchases and two teams of the same level to go the distance.“ Looking back on those words six months later, how far Napoli have come forward under Mazzarri in so little time is dramatic indeed.
Hamsik, along with Cavani and Lavezzi were deployed to lethal use by Mazzarri
For people who cannot understand the magnitude of Napoli’s success, this will suffice to explain it. The turnaround in fortunes was bigger than man landing on mars and talking football. For a Napoli fan, it was even bigger than Spurs’ Champions League Qualification a year ago. The 2010-11 was the most memorable one for the club fans since the magical Maradona days when they won the Serie A in 1989-90 and qualified for the UCL. That was the last time they were in Europe. 21 years later, an Italian tactician from Tuscany ended the wait. How did Mazzarri orchestrate the great Napoli renaissance?
Tactically speaking Mazzarri is one of the very managers who uses the 3 defender formation i.e. 3-5-2 and its variation 3-4-2-1. And doesn’t he use it brilliantly! Napoli played brilliant fluid football last season which had the right mix of exquisiteness and balance. And the most important thing is the trust the manager had in his formation. Though the team had limited class and for that matter limited technicality, Napoli under Mazzarri were a robust unit.
Napoli had Pablo Cannavaro, Argentine Campagnaro, and Grava forming the solid back 3. The presence of the trio brought great solidity to the back and hence the two flanks with Maggio, flanked on the right and Dossena or with options like Zuniga or Aronica on the left flank offered offensives and displayed great physical stamina. Uruguayan midfielder Gargano, well know for his ability to recover the ball quickly, and Pazienza formed a solid double pivot in the heart of the midfield. These two defensive midfielders, despite not constructing exquisite passes as Iniesta and Xavi do, held the ball and reclaimed it from the opposition often calming the defence and thus providing solidity.
The front trio of Napoli were probably the most deadly in the Serie A, with close competition coming from those of Udinese and Milan. Slovakian Marek Hamsik, Uruguayan striker Edinson Cavani and Argentinian Ezequiel Lavezzi were lethal in their forays forward and were the stars of the season for the team. Marek Hamsik played as the attacking midfielder and his role lay in linking the midfield and the attack. Though Lavezzi played as a forward, he had this assisting role which he did to perfection, and with this capabilities Mazzarri had the option of 3-4-2-1, deploying Hamsik on the left and Lavezzi on the right. Then lay up front the leading striker, who displayed tremendous explosiveness and shooting, Edinson Cavani who scored an astonishing 26 league goals and almost won the Capocannoniere. Such was the productivity of the formation was that Napoli did exceedingly well against the better pedigreed and rich clubs like Juventus and Roma who had more of the traditional formation of 4-4-2. As Napoli settled into the formation and began to show their promise, Mazzarri said in March 2010 that his team were aiming for the Champions League and were going to get there in style. “I want to see total football where everyone can score.” Two months later, he made good on his promise as he delivered Napoli to the promised land by drawing at home to Inter.
Bright future in store
Mazzarri, also known as the young Fabio Capello got a contract extension with the Naples club till 2013, but his future has been of tremendous speculation as his exploits have attracted Europe’s elite. Rumours flew around of him getting the sack and getting linked with the resurrection job at Juventus, but the speculation has died down now and it is now certain that 48 year old Mazzarri will be leading Napoli’s charge in the Champions League next season. As he embarks on his next big quest, don’t be surprised to see him in our next season’s Managers of the Year list, perhaps at a higher position.
Also read #10 in the Sportskeeda Managers Series
