Brazilian football legend and 2007 Ballon d’Or winner Ricardo Kaka has revealed that he does not mind following the footsteps of his former teammate Andrea Pirlo.
Kaka and Pirlo played together at Italian Serie A club, AC Milan, at the prime of their football career. Though Pirlo spent all his football career in Serie A before he moved to Major League Soccer, Kaka switched to Spanish La Liga between 2009 and 2013 to play for Real Madrid.
Immediately after Pirlo retired from playing football, he started moves to become a football coach and was appointed by his former club Juventus as the football manager of the club’s under-23 team.
Nine days after he started his new job at Juventus, the former Inter Milan and Italian midfielder was made the football manager of Juventus after Maurizio Sarri was sacked. He was given a two-year contract to rebuild the team, continue their dominance in Italian football and dominant European club football.
Two months after his appointment, Pirlo received his UEFA Pro Licence on 16 September 2020 after scoring 107 out of 110 marks for his 30-page thesis, entitled “The football that I would like”.
In an interview with La Gazzetta dello Sport, Kaka said he enjoys seeing his former teammates involved in managing great soccer clubs but he didn’t expect that Pirlo would become the head coach of a big club like Juventus three years after retiring from playing the game.
The 38-year-old Brazilian football icon however noted that a player like Pirlo who has won almost everything in world football as a player and has played under some of the greatest coaches in the game would make a very unique coach.
“It’s fun. I enjoy seeing my former teammates being involved in great teams,” Kaka said.
“He seemed destined to take over the youth team and work his way up, but he has already arrived there.
“Andrea knows football. It will be nice to follow him. He has been fortunate to work with and learn from many great coaches. Ancelotti, Allegri, Conte…
“In the end, I still think Pirlo will be unique, even as a coach.”
Though Pirlo did not win the Ballon d’Or, the Italian football icon has won virtually everything that is there to win in soccer for both club and country except the UEFA European Championship where he went as far as playing in the final in 2012.
While Kaka has won everything in the game of soccer for both club and country except the South American Championship / Copa América.
