Silvio Baldini and the rough hand on his neck

I find him on the line after a long time. He’s wearing glasses that seem to go hand in hand with his moustache, clinging to his face like a mask. He looks like one of the parents from Zelig in Woody Allen’s brilliant film. Silvio Baldini talks about his venture with the young Azzurri, hurling stones instead of words. He never laughs; he hasn’t laughed for ages. He suffered a terrible loss with the death of his disabled daughter, who was his reason for living. Since then, he has chosen to be even more sincere and direct than usual. He recalls how returning to the national team after the family tragedy was, for him, a return to life. “I felt like I was 80,” he said, “but after just a few seconds with my young lads, I was reborn.” How this unconventional, anarchic and, consequently, heretical man ended up in the Azzurri remains a mystery to me. How did he manage it? Who chose him? He was chosen by Buffon, his near-fellow townsman, backed by Gravina.

It was not an easy choice, as it was a very awkward one. Baldini has always been held in high regard by coaches, but opposed by politicians. He is a pioneering manager, a trailblazer in his day. His playing system at Empoli set a precedent, with a 4-2-3-1 formation that, at the time – almost twenty years ago – was not particularly in vogue. The image that stands out most vividly in our minds is the tackle he delivered to Mimmo Di Carlo in the Parma v Catania match in 2004. I am rewatching the scene just to refresh my memory, and I have discovered something I had completely forgotten. It was Di Carlo who provoked Baldini with a light slap that landed on the back of his hand. Baldini reacted with a reflex reminiscent of Laurel and Hardy, but it was not amusing. From that moment on, Baldini became ‘the one who got kicked in the backside’, and nothing else really mattered. He began to drift in and out of the limelight, retired, then returned, declared “I don’t want money”, struggled, laughed less and less, and when he seemed to have been forgotten by everyone, he made a comeback, on the cusp of his seventies.

It is an extraordinary narrative: once he has donned the national team’s kit, he summons predominantly technical players, positions them effectively on the pitch and secures victories. The remark about the swindlers, in my opinion, precludes any possibility of his coaching the senior national team. In footballing terms, Baldini is the son of Corrado Orrico and a close relative of Arrigo Sacchi. They are all visionary and ‘crazy’ managers. Of that rare kind of madness that smacks of genius. There is a distinct literary quality to it, something one might write down and read aloud in a low voice, unseen by others. A crime, an embrace that is slightly too tight, a slap, a caress, a rough hand on the neck, an unexpected kiss. The sun behind the moon. A beauty that is present, yet still to come.