Juve, Spalletti in Turin today: there is an agreement until June, with renewal in the event of Champio

One signature and Luciano Spalletti will take command of the Juventus ship. Signature expected in the next few hours, tomorrow at the latest. And he signs a contract which, for the former Italian coach, must have the profound meaning of a revenge, with himself, with his world. The Juventus club thus finds the square of a somewhat shaky, somewhat confused circle: Spalletti did not get involved on the issue of the duration of the agreement because there was no reason to do so when you have in mind the desire to get back into the game thanks to what you will achieve on the pitch and not thanks to what you could be entitled to through formal means. The post-Tudor period translates into the great turning point and not into the gamble that would have had Palladino’s face: Luciano da Certaldo will join Continassa for this season and the next in the event that Locatelli and his associates finish their effort inside the top four, but it is not excluded that the automatic renewal with the Champions pass in hand will extend until June 2028. We are changing, therefore. And we change by handing over the immediate future to an “injured” coach. “I have the ambition to make right what happened to me…”, so Spalletti. What happened to him is a dull, deflated national team, full of input to the point of sending thoughts into a tailspin: this is what the former Italian coach showed us at the 2024 European Championships and in the sad trip to Norway which will now force us once again to play the world playoffs.

Palladino in conversation

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Juventus and Spalletti will have to tell a different story: harmony between management and coach, empathy between coach and locker room. The Comolli method, the way of working of the next Juventus CEO, meant that yesterday the interviews for the post Igor also involved the same alternative but distant candidate, Raffaele Palladino: Spalletti in the early morning, the former Monza and Fiorentina helmsman in the afternoon, because the technical director François Modesto was there to cheer for him. The match was only a matter of courtesy, Spalletti and his desire to embrace the new cause under the Mole began to play with the advantage and ended the face-to-face hour with a clear advantage. The coach of lost Italy is convinced that he will regain the pace of his best moments: Yildiz will be his guiding star, the rest of the company will be a group of kids left free to grow and express themselves. “Whoever takes Tudor’s place can consider themselves lucky because Igor left a well-trained team…”, the Tuscan coach’s reflection on a long and not at all banal day. Spalletti said yes to the Juventus cause in an instant, or rather less: being resurrected at the helm of a club with a global dimension is too good an opportunity to miss. Today, Luciano da Certaldo will be in Turin, then the announcement: there is no rush, the choice has been made. His first real challenge will fall on the fourth day of the Champions League, the initial phase: next Tuesday, Sporting Lisbon will arrive at the Stadium, woe betide them not to win. No definitive request on the duration of the contract, a brief overview of what the moves on the January market could be, a postponement on the definition of the economic aspects to today even if he should earn around 3 million euros until June: Spalletti’s first contact with the Juventus planet went like this. Comolli and Modesto waited for Giorgio Chiellini’s return to Turin before drawing on what they had heard: the Juventus Foreign Minister, in Riyadh to represent the club, has never played defense on the name of a coach he respects and has always known. The ex, among other things, of Roma, Inter, Napoli, for Chiellini, may be the most logical profile to restore momentum to the season of a team that has not won for eight games and which has not scored for four, but not only that: Spalletti, for Chiello, can open a cycle as in the recent past. The signature is expected in the next few hours, then eyes on the away match against Cremona on the agenda on Saturday evening: the poster says that that will be the debut match of a coach in search of the happiness lost with the blue uniform. Spalletti’s last evening on the bench was a surreal one: on the bench with the national team after being sacked in Reggio Emilia’s win against Moldova. Stories from a June ago, stories in reverse: not even five months and here is the great, great chance. Not to be missed and, in fact, he didn’t miss it: Palladino and Mancini were separated in the race to post-Tudor. At stake is a personal journey to be restored to the center of the village.