Italy’s failure to qualify for the final stages of the 2026 World Cup — a humiliation for a nation that won the tournament just four years earlier — has triggered an institutional crisis at the FIGC that now threatens to consume both the new technical director and his chosen head coach before either has had the chance to prove themselves.
The Pirlo Problem
Paolo Maldini, appointed as Italy’s technical director earlier this summer, moved swiftly to select Andrea Pirlo as his preferred candidate for the head coaching role — a decision that generated immediate enthusiasm among supporters nostalgic for the golden era of Italian football, but one that has encountered significant institutional resistance.
FIGC president Giovanni Malagò is understood to be orientated against approving Pirlo’s appointment. The reasons are not entirely footballing — a combination of concerns about Pirlo’s coaching experience, political calculations within Italian football’s governing structure, and a broader question mark over whether the Pirlo-Maldini axis represents the bold generational reset Italy genuinely needs, or a nostalgic gesture dressed up as renewal.
Maldini’s Response: Without Pirlo, He Walks
The development that has transformed a manageable disagreement into a full-scale crisis is Maldini’s reported response to Malagò’s resistance. According to La Gazzetta dello Sport, the former AC Milan captain is prepared to resign from his technical director role if his chosen coach is not approved. It is a high-stakes gamble — and one that has placed the FIGC hierarchy in an extremely uncomfortable position.
The Plan B: Chiellini as Technical Director, Conte or Mancini as Coach
Should Maldini indeed step down and the Pirlo appointment be formally blocked, two scenarios are under discussion as potential alternatives. In the first, Giorgio Chiellini — currently in a directorial role at Juventus — would be approached to take over as technical director of the national team, working alongside Antonio Conte as head coach. The Tevez endorsement of that exact combination, delivered during the World Cup, will not have gone unnoticed in the relevant corridors of power.
The second possibility involves a return for Roberto Mancini — the manager who delivered Italy the European Championship in 2021, and who remains one of the most immediately recognisable names in Italian football. His relationship with the FIGC ended acrimoniously when he walked away for the Saudi Arabia national team job, but in a moment of genuine institutional emergency, stranger reconciliations have happened.
What This Means for Chiellini — and for Juventus
For Juventus supporters, the Chiellini dimension is the most immediately relevant subplot. The club’s Director of Football Strategy has been a key figure in the new administration under Carnevali, and his departure to take on a national federation role — even one as significant as Italy’s technical director — would represent another unwanted piece of institutional turbulence at a club already in the middle of a complex rebuild. Whether Chiellini himself would be willing to leave the Continassa at this precise moment, given the work still to be done, is a question without a clear answer.
The Italy job, however, is arguably the most prestigious non-coaching role in Italian football. If the call came, the pull would be considerable — and the situation is moving fast enough that a definitive resolution may arrive before the week is out.
