Friday, 11 April 2014
When he took the Inter job he had no idea of the sort of Kafkian situation he would soon experience in Milan. Criticized for everything he did and didn’t do, he finally finds himself defending his work in front of a jury and a combative plaintiff…
As he walks into the courtroom he realises he’s not alone. On the lateral stands, mixed with the press, stand Andrea Stramaccioni, Claudio Ranieri, Rafa Benitez, Roberto Mancini, and further back Hector Cuper and Marco Tardelli, Alberto Zaccheroni and Mircea Lucescu, Marcello Lippi and Gigi Simoni, in what seems to be an extremely democratic audience. No matter the accolades - Serie A titles or World Cups, Europa Leagues or Premier Leagues -, they are all part of the same family. Walter is the last specimen standing. He holds the burden of being the last coach selected by the previous owners and at the same time the first under Erick Thohir.
The Inter coach heads wearily towards the dock, his defense attorney constantly by his side. They went through his defensive line all night, and as he repeated his monologue, Mazzarri gained the confidence that a man under the spotlight like him needs, in order to convince the jury of his innocence.
Defensive Line. When called to the stand, WM turns towards the jury and starts his defense. “First of all I am honored to be the coach of a glorious club such as Inter. I want to thank both Moratti and Erick Thohir for the confidence they gave me. However, I want to point out that this isn’t exactly my team. Not yet at least. I was hired last summer, when nobody knew about the subsequent managerial revolution. This obviously had some implications on the lads’ concentration. I’m not blaming Moratti nor Mr. Thohir, don’t get me wrong. I just want you to consider every mitigating circumstance".
"The team is very young, and some of the players are potential stars, but are not stars quite yet. They’ve been suffering this lack of power within the club. Not that Mr. Thohir didn’t do a great job in staying by the team. Again, don’t misunderstand my words. And consider the injuries. Have you seen Icardi lately? Imagine what I could have done with him at full strength from the beginning of the season. Instead he was injured often, like Milito, and I had to play with Palacio all by himself up-front. I was forced to do so".
"Plus, several players finally blossomed under my lead. Take Jonathan: he was a joke, now he’s even a candidate to go to Brazil with the Azzurri jersey. Can you believe it? I can, because I’m a hard worker, and I know how to get the best out of my players.”
The Tuscan coach goes on talking without a break for minutes. Suddenly he stops, he swipes his sweaty forehead, takes a sip of his sparkling water from a plastic cup, and raises his arm, pointing his finger in the middle of the audience. “I’m not like you”, he suddenly shouts to the former Inter managers, all sacked by Moratti. “I’ve never been fired in my whole career, and you all know”, turning his head in the jury’s direction, “what this means in Italy. I am currently the only trainer in Serie A never to lose his job. And that’s because I never failed.”
“In 2006-07 I saved Reggina while starting the season from minus 15 points due to the Calciopoli sentence. I won a trophy- a Coppa Italia- with Napoli after a 22-year drought, and I led the Azzurri back to the first Champions League participation since the Maradona era, reaching the round of 16 despite a group with Bayern Munich, Manchester City and Villareal, and we almost knocked out Chelsea.” “If I will be given my chance here, the club, the players, the fans, will not regret it.”
The crowd murmurs, a few people clap their hands in appreciation, before the judge’s voice re-establishes order: “SILENCE!” Walter Mazzarri proudly stares at the crowd, and sits. His attorney, who still hadn’t opened his mouth, concludes.
“With another man, Inter would be struggling to stay in Serie A this season. Not because the team lacks talent, but because this particular environment is a very complicated one. The fans are impatient, and even if they are aware of the (modest) team goals at the beginning of the season, if you don’t win, you get booed nonetheless. With everything that’s happened, my client had the balls to handle the changing management, the players, and the fans, all at the same time.”
“Members of the jury, you must admit, without any reasonable doubt, that this season hasn’t been normal at all. It’s been extraordinary, and as such, it cannot be taken as an example. My client’s career says that he’s been improving, year after year. That’s why he deserves his chance to a “normal” season with these glorious colors.”
“Finally, Inter decided to change, both ownership and philosophy. Well, if you decide to let go my client after just one year, nothing will have changed: it will be the old, disorganized, shortsighted Inter, that we’ve been used to see since 1995.”
The prosecution. The plaintiff stands, seemingly unimpressed. He clears his throat, and begins. “Mr. Mazzarri, you’re unfit to coach a club like Inter. And this is not me speaking. This is the majority of the fan base speaking. You’re a whiner, a well of excuses, a good coach, but not a winner.”
"There hasn’t been a game after which you haven’t complained either about the referee, bad luck, inexperience, the weather or the conditions of the pitch. On the one hand this offers an alibi to the players, because they know that even if they don’t win, their coach will be the first one to find a “plausible” excuse for them. On the other, everyone is making fun of you. And as a consequence they’re making fun of the team you represent. There are tons of Facebook pages that make fun of you, did you know that? You’re a joke, even for Inter fans.”
“You’ve been criticizing young players since the beginning of the season. I mean, that’s fine, not something you can be blamed for. Unless of course your team’s composed mostly of young players. Your key human **** are youngsters, and you publicly thrash them more often the not?! What is the masochist logic behind this behavior? Have you ever heard Mourinho say that a player is too young to start? No. That’s because players should play if they’re good, regardless of the age.”
“Shall we open the “Kovacic” chapter? The Croatian went from wonder-boy to desaparecido, and I’m not referring to his acting abilities. You’re killing his talent! You’ve often put players like Kuzmanovic and Taider in front of him.”
"Not to mention the style of play of your team. For most of the season you played with a single striker- Palacio-, while defending with 10 players behind the ball. That’s the kind of mentality you can afford when you coach Reggina, not a club that was European Champion only four years ago.” “You had a few goals this season, and one was that of growing the key players for the coming years. The other was to reach at least the Europa League. You’ve failed at the first, and who knows about the second?”
The plaintiff stops for a second, almost encouraging an answer from the defendant’s table. “You’ve always criticized the past technical management, but your production after 32 games has been exactly the same. I-DEN-TI-CAL: 50 points each. The difference, up to now, is that Stramaccioni also had to play the EL. Oh, and that his gross salary was € 2M versus your € 7M. Are you really telling us that this money is well earned?”
Another, final, theatrical pause. “In conclusion, your honor, members of the jury, I have demonstrated that this man is unfit for this job. For the good of the club, you should lay him off. Inter is undergoing an epochal revolution. They are trying to become a multinational business, from the family firm they’ve been up until now. In order to complete such transformation, the club needs people and managers with the same, open, international vision. Mazzarri simply doesn’t have this vision. You must show Mazzarri the door.”
The facts are now clear, and the jury will now retire to decide its verdict. It will take more or less one month, or 540 minutes of Serie A football. On the one hand we have a coach who’s never been sacked. On the other a club that in its recent past has never been particularly good at keeping nor retaining its coaches, but that has just entered a new cycle. Let the jury decide.
svaka cast na trudu , mislim da moze da igra jos jednu sezonu ali ne u Interu, bio bi dobar u Veroni ili nekom dole klubu jer kod nas dise na aparate vec 2 sezone.
