Rome (AP) – When almost 64,000 football fans showed their love, even the experienced Claudio Ranieri had tears in his eyes.
As a guest of honour, the 70-year-old watched the semi-final second leg of the Conference League between AS Roma and Leicester City (1-0) when it was shown on the stadium screen on Thursday evening. The fans of both teams, where the native Roman was the coach, stood up spontaneously and applauded the visibly surprised coach. He finally got up and waved, touched.
Since the late 1980s, Ranieri has worked as a coach in Italy, Spain, England, France and Greece. He celebrated his greatest success with Leicester when they sensationally won the Premier League title in 2015/16. He coached Roma twice, from 2009 to 2011 and in the 2019 season finale. Most recently, he was coach at Watford FC in the English first division, but had to leave there in January after just 16 disappointing weeks in a relegation battle.