It was on a glorious June afternoon of last year when Enzo Maresca received the phone call he had been waiting for.

Leicester City wanted to meet with him to discuss becoming their new head coach. There was just one small problem: they wanted to meet on a day he had plans. Plans he felt, for the sake of his family, he couldn’t disrupt.

For Maresca, football and family run parallel. Both are hugely important aspects of his life but what happens when the two collide? A big decision, that’s what.

That’s exactly what faced Maresca on that day in June when deciding whether he should go it alone once again as a head coach in his own right.

Family and football

Pep Guardiola, who Maresca worked under at Manchester City, always said the Italian was destined to be number one in his own right. He was too ambitious and too capable to settle for being an assistant for too long.

Maresca was a popular figure across his two spells at Manchester City. Cole Palmer and Romeo Lavia can attest to that, with the Chelsea pair having worked with their new head coach in Manchester when he led City’s Development Squad. Successfully led, we hasten to add.

So when the opportunity came to go it alone at Leicester, he had the blessing of Guardiola and his trusted circle. But it was still a big decision for Maresca and one he had to seriously think about given the fact a meeting to discuss taking over at the King Power clashed with his son’s birthday party. He almost didn’t make the meeting.

 

Enzo and his family share a close bond

 

His son, Paolo, the eldest of his four children, was turning 10 and had a birthday party scheduled. It was a day of celebration in the Maresca household, not only for his young boy but also for Enzo, as it came just 24 hours after helping City lift the FA Cup following victory over rivals Manchester United.

After much deliberation, Enzo decided the Leicester job was worth pursuing and he headed to the East Midlands. He made a mental note to himself that everything that day had to be ‘worth it’.

If he was prepared to miss his son’s birthday party, it had to be worth it. And as it turned out, taking the Leicester job, winning the Championship title, and all the roads leading him to Chelsea was certainly ‘worth it’.

Young Maresca in England

While Maresca has spent the last few years in England, albeit punctured by a short stint back in his homeland as manager of Parma, the Italian first arrived on these shores as an 18-year-old in 1998, starting his professional career in the West Midlands with West Bromwich Albion.

 

I’m not nervous or scared to start new things. At 18, I moved to England without speaking the language.ENZO MARESCA

 

Moving to the outskirts of Birmingham with no grasp of the English language may have put many young foreign players off, but Enzo embraced the challenge and believes it shaped his character.

‘I’m not nervous or scared to start new things,’ the Italian said in a previous interview.

‘When I was 18, I said I would move from Italy to England. It was something new and I did not speak a word of English. When you move from, in my case, Italy to England directly to Birmingham, you can adapt immediately to the language and to the country.

‘Then from there, I come back to Italy with a big club, the best club in Italy. Juventus.’

 

The Italian celebrates promotion with his staff

 

Being bold, as Maresca was, paid off and that’s a mantra that has followed the dogged and determined Italian throughout his career and life.

Working with legends

We have to acknowledge the plethora of managerial greats who have welcomed Maresca into their inner sanctum during his coaching career.

While playing alongside former Chelsea title winner Antonio Conte at Juventus, he was managed by another former Blues trophy collector: Carlo Ancelotti.

He also shared a dressing room with Zinedine Zidane, Pavel Nedved and Gianluigi Buffon.

Maresca has also worked under Marcelo Lippi and Manuel Pellegrini, and these big names allowed Enzo to take elements from each great to help shape his coaching philosophy.

 

Maresca worked alongside Pep Guardiola at Manchester City

 

Not to mention what he learned from Guardiola—a man he will face off against in the Premier League this season—from his time working under the Spaniard at City.

‘I have been lucky to learn from many managers, like Ancelotti, Lippi, and Manuel Pellegrini, so you can take things and make your own ideas,’ Maresca said in that interview last summer.

‘Because I was at City, you cannot think to try to copy from Pep. You can learn a lot every day, many things, but to copy it is very difficult because he is so good and you cannot think in the way he is thinking.’

It’s clear from the way Enzo has set up his previous teams that he has taken inspiration from his former mentors into his new fledglings, as proven by the way he delivered ‘Enzo-ball’ at the King Power Stadium. But what exactly does ‘Enzo-ball’ entail?

Dissecting ‘Enzo-ball’

‘Playing football the Enzo way’ is what the Leicester City fans would chant with glee as the Foxes stormed, albeit with a slight hurdle around March, to the Championship title.

So what, exactly, is ‘the Enzo way’ and how can ‘Enzo-ball’, as it’s been monikered, be broken down?

 

Maresca’s brand of football impressed the Leicester fans

 

Firstly, Maresca likes his teams to dominate possession. That much was clear from the way his Leicester side played, suffocating teams by keeping hold of the ball and utilising a patient build-up.

The Italian often used an inverted full-back—normally Ricardo Pereira or Hamza Choudhury at Leicester—to help create a box midfield. From here, two players would sit deeper and two other midfielders would push higher to help in attack.

The idea is that an available pass to a team-mate is always on, which means the side can work around opponents lining up in a 4-3-3 or 4-2-3-1 formation. Either a player can pass sideways to a team-mate or play through the lines to the pushed-on midfielders to create an overload in the final third.

 

Enzo leaves no stone unturned tactically

 

What’s next?

Maresca will soon report for work with Chelsea, officially starting at the beginning of July as the players report for pre-season work before heading off on tour to the USA.

Our new head coach, who will bring in a number of staff with him from Leicester to be part of his external team, will then run the rule over his new squad before deciding who to take to America as part of our pre-season tour—a key element as we gear up to the new Premier League season.

 

I have been lucky to learn from many great managers but in the end, you make your own ideas.ENZO MARESCA

 

One familiar face will join him, with former Chelsea goalkeeper Willy Caballero returning. He will surely give the Italians a rundown of what to expect at Chelsea and Cobham as they prepare for work.

It shows how Enzo embraces new challenges at different cultures by the fact he lived at Leicester’s Seagrave training centre during pre-season last year, helping him to immerse himself in life in the East Midlands before settling on a new place to live in the city once he finally felt integrated into the club.

 

Welcome to Chelsea, Enzo!

 

Whether he will do the same at Cobham remains to be seen, but one thing is certain: a new era under an exciting new coach awaits, and Maresca will be leaving no stone unturned in his quest for success.

Benvenuto a Chelsea, Enzo!