Ex Italian footballer, Alessandro Del Piero has backed his former team-mate Andrea Pirlo to be successful in his new manageria role in Juventus. The 45 year-old is confident that the midfield maestro can even do better than his counterpart at Real Madrid, Zinedine Zidane.
Pirlo was announced as the new coach of seria A side, Juventus following the sack of ex manager, Maurizio Sarri after their Champions League last-16 exit to Lyon on Friday.
Piero spoke of his surprise about Pirlo’s appointment to Sky Sport Italia, ‘To be honest, I wouldn’t have bet on him becoming the coach. It’s a surprise for me too, I was already pleased for him taking the Under-23 role and thought that was the right move for him, but he’s skipped ahead, so I can only wish him luck. I think the general perception of former players who become coaches is changing in Italy. Before, there was this need to go through a long process in the lower leagues to learn the trade, but in recent years we’ve seen Filippo and Simone Inzaghi succeed, plus Gennaro Gattuso. They were great players and started straight away with great teams.’
He is also confident that Pirlo can also be reverred like Zidane at the Bernabeu.
‘It’s not a fair comparison, because Zizou had already worked with the Real Madrid youth team and then was Carlo Ancelotti’s assistant manager, but Pirlo has everything it takes to do even better than Zidane, He already knows the club, the players, the directors, so I think they communicated in a very clear way.’