Top 19 Carlo Ancelotti Quotes

At the start of my two years at Juventus, I had big plans for the club, but it turned out that the Intertoto Cup was the only medal in my desk drawer when finally they told me to pack my bags. We started the first season really well, and Conte was so important for me.

For me, the Premier League is full of quality, and the clubs competing at the top are the same who compete at the top of Europe every year.

My impression of Abramovich is that he loves football, his club, and his players. He wants to know everything that is going on and is very passionate. Berlusconi, too, loves his club, but he was a man of the people and conducted his life in public.

I’m in favour of innovation, just as long as the game does not suffer for it.

I have never seen a talent like Ronaldo. He always scores, scores, scores. The first game he played for Milan, Sienna away, I said to him, ‘I can’t put you on the pitch. You are 100kg.’ ‘Mister,’ he said, ‘don’t worry, I will score.’ I put him in, and he scored twice.

To find a clear identity for the team – that is not about buying certain players for a lot of money. It is about getting players who want to play the right way.

I have worked with some of the most important players, like Ronaldo, Ibrahimovic, Kaka, Zidane, but the best are easy to work with because they are so professional. Their winning mentality, professionalism, helps the manager. Of course, sometimes I become angry, but usually my relationship with the players is calm.

I love my job. I don’t find it stressful, and I only took a rest because I didn’t find another club after Real. It was not something that I needed because of stress, because that is not a problem for me. I don’t have pressure. I like my job, and I know how it is. I have experience.

The fact that these owners sacked me doesn’t mean that our relationship is broken. I still get on well with Florentino, and although I haven’t spoken much with Abramovich since I left Chelsea, I have no problem with him.

When I arrived at Juventus as the manager in 1999, Antonio Conte was the captain of the club, an Italy international, and a player who had a lot of influence in the dressing room – and when I needed a leader in the team, he was the obvious choice.

Football is the most important of the less important things in the world.

That is what a good manager does – you study and think and discuss, and you come up with a model of playing.

Usually, a Brazilian doesn’t like to work hard in training, doesn’t like to stay focused. I trained a lot of Brazilian players. I had a problem with Ronaldo at Milan. It was not easy to get him fit! Ronaldo was 100kg but was the quickest in the 10 metre test!

I have a lot of power. Here, I can decide: training at six in the morning! Training 11 in the night! But my style is not to impose. I would like to convince the players of what they are doing. This takes more time.

I think it’s actually more difficult to come to a club where everything is going great and everyone is happy. When you take over from a guy who has been sacked because things weren’t going well, it’s more straightforward.

I spent eight years with Berlusconi, and I still have a good relationship with him.

You tell them that all your experience tells you this is the best way to beat this particular opposition. You persuade them and you drill them, and you tell them so many times they can hear you when they go to sleep. Then, on the day of the game, you stand on the touchline and hope to God that it works.

I like to be funny. I can’t stay all the time focused, disciplined, controlled. Behaviour like that is impossible. If the players are too nervous before a game, I have to relax them, calm them.

Usually, the most intelligent player is a midfielder.