MILAN, 4 July 2011 Who knows if Galliani guessed things would turn out like this when he claimed Allegri was the perfect fit for AC Milan. A year ago, the main factor behind the Rossoneri board's decision to plump for Massimiliano Allegri was the "beautiful football" he got Cagliari and Sassuolo playing. Nothing more, nothing less. Now, on the third floor in Via Turati, there is a "coach" who has become a "manager", in the English interpretation of the role – that is, someone who deals with more than just teach tactics and technical skills. A person whose realm doesn't end at the gates of Milanello (AC Milan's training ground) but whose influence extends upstairs. Let's say he's a sort of Italian Alex Ferguson minus the wallet: Allegri doesn't have the cash to flash in the transfer market, and the final decision remains with the club's directors, but he is in daily contact with the purse-string pullers. Something that he already did at Cagliari.
HOME FROM HOME IN VIA TURATI — A mini-revolution has taken place at the club which, in the Berlusconi days, had become used to running internal affairs in their own way. Nowadays plans are made almost on a daily basis. They have found harmony through instinctive understanding and mutual admiration resulting in a close, working, professional relationship between Allegri and Galliani on a day-to-day basis. They sometimes lunch or dine together, the coach follows his vice-president on his travels (which are usually connected with transfer deals these days) to Versilia, he participates in the bargaining (He was present at all of the contract-renewal meetings), if there is one being played they sometimes watch a match together like the Under-20s finals, or to put it bluntly, even though he doesn't have an office there in via Turati, recently Allegri has been seen in the building at least once a day, if not twice. An example? He ate with Galliani a few weekends ago, the following morning he was at a meeting in Via Turati with his staff and then, in the afternoon he was off to yet another meeting with Kaka senior and Gaetano Paolillo. Just because he lives nearby doen't really explain all of this, though. "We see things in a similar light, and agree on everything," Galliani summed up the situation.
AUTONOMY AND TRUST — It's obvious to everyone that this is a new way here at AC Milan of interpreting the relationship with the coach including his predecessors. Without going too far back in time, Ancelotti hardly ever went into the building and Leonardo stopped going there as soon as he became coach. So after his "on-the-pitch" revolution (with AC Milan light and nimble on their feet, changing to all running and muscle), Max from Livorno is offering the club a new interpretation of the club-coach relationship. AC Milan needed only one season and one Scudetto picked up at the first bite to start trusting him. The sensation in the corridors is that Allegri is a coach who the management of the club listen to. Most certainly more than some of his predecessors. Managing Ronaldinho, who was one of his president's favourites, is probably the best example of the autonomy and power he has been awarded by the club. And he has repaid them by rolling up his sleeves and and putting his nose to the grindstone. The "handsome guy with the face of an actor" as Berlusconi described him recently has left his job to someone with the face of an all-round coach. Even off the pitch.
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