News, goals, and analysis – only on the official A BOLA app. Despite the dream of seeing Pep Guardiola at the helm of the Italian national team after the third consecutive failure to qualify for the World Cup, the idea is not unanimous. Luciano Buonfiglio, president of the Italian Olympic Committee, has expressed strong opposition to hiring the Spanish coach, arguing that the position should be filled by an Italian. It is worth noting that the president of the Italian Football Federation (FIGC), Giovanni Malagò, admitted on Wednesday that he is in talks with the coach from Santpedor, although he warned that the operation might not materialize. However, Buonfiglio’s opposition is clear. In a direct message to Malagò, the official was emphatic in an interview with Corriere dello Sport: ‘The only thing I ask Giovanni is to choose an Italian coach.’ For Buonfiglio, betting on a foreign coach would be a mistake, undermining the prestigious Italian coaching school. To reinforce his point of view, the president of the Olympic Committee recalled a bad experience from his past when he led the Italian Canoeing Federation and hired a German coach. According to Buonfiglio, the foreign coach did not take an interest in the ‘mentality or idiosyncrasy of the Italian athlete, losing the solid foundation that had been built in previous years.’ ‘The vast majority of our Serie A coaches are Italian: it is with them that the coach will have to deal. They are good, professional, and a product of our tradition. Why exclude them? When I was president of the Canoeing Federation, I made the mistake of hiring a German coach: he was good, but he did not bother to understand the Italian mentality. We won nothing, and all the good work we had done previously went down the drain,’ Buonfiglio explained.
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