Pedro Pablo Pasculli shared the dressing room with Antonio Conte at Lecce, the side of new Chelsea manager native city, in the late 80s. Meanwhile he was sharing another dressing room, the one of Argentina national team, with one of the greatest footballer in history: Diego Armando Maradona, with whom he won the World Cup in 1986 in Mexico.
Now Pasculli is a manager, like Conte, and he’s currently in charge at Jumilla, a Spanish third division side.
He is still friend with the Italian coach, they meet whenever their job duties allow them in Italy, so he knows the new Blues manager really well.
We reached him to have an opinion of the new Chelsea boss and what the Blues fans can expect from him:
“I think Chelsea made the right choice appointing Conte, because he’s got a strong character, what he learnt on the pitch when he was playing was then transmitted to his players.
“He demands 110% from the players, from everyone, so I guess he will do a good job in England because of this. English football is tough, very energetic, it’s really focused on physical strength and his sides always played this way, with long balls and a lot of playing on the wings. He’s got the right approach for English football.
“His football is really different from the one of Pep Guardiola, that prefers fast ball possession ( tiki taka). The Spanish manager risks to have issues if he doesn’t adapt a little bit to English style.
“Conte is a great motivator, demands a lot, I agree with people that compare him to José Mourinho, that is really able to motivate the players, the people that surround him and the fans, and he’s also able to control the press.
“Antonio will do well because he knows he has to give 100% to become popular and respected also out of Italy.
“Next year he won’t play in the Champions League, but this can be a little advantage for him because he has to build a team to compete in the Premier League title race so to qualify again for the Champions League. It would be a problem for Chelsea to not qualify for two years in a row, so he knows he has to do well, I hope he can resist there for at least a couple of years.
“It’s also a personal challenge for him, to do better in the Champions League where he was not very successful in the two seasons with Juventus, and I think he’s got the strength to do it.
“On the language barrier: I guess he studied English in these months, because he has been in contact with Chelsea for a while, they have been negotiating for months. Maybe at the beginning he can have some little issues for team speeches, because on the touchline you don’t have to use many words to give directions, but he is a really smart guy, he was also attending the university when we played together in Lecce, and I am sure he prepared himself at his best for this experience.”
Source: transfermarketweb.com