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Corriere della Sera - National team case, controversy also erupts over Pirlo and Maldini’s sons: Nicolò and Christian’s links with players’ agencies, and the Lippi precedent

New background details are coming out on the increasingly complex issue of the Azzurri’s next head coach.

Fresh tension and fresh concern are building for the newly appointed president of the Italian Football Federation, Giovanni Malagò. Political controversy over the sponsorship agreement with Russian betting agency Fonbet and the trips to Moscow by possible new Italy head coach Andrea Pirlo had already placed him under pressure. Now the matter involving the children of the Brescia-born coach and technical director Paolo Maldini is also reaching the desk of the man at the top of Via Allegri.

The facts

According to Il Corriere della Sera, a new wave of protests could erupt if Pirlo is actually appointed. He is due to lead his United FC side in the friendly against Salzburg in Austria today, but he is still waiting for a fresh contact from the FIGC to make the agreement official until 2030, worth €1.5 million per season. The issue revolves around the roles held at two different player agencies by Nicolò Pirlo and Christian Maldini, the eldest sons of Andrea Pirlo and Paolo Maldini. The former handles intermediary work and scouting for You First, whose clients also include Spain’s World Cup-winning head coach Luis de la Fuente, while the latter works with Giuseppe Riso’s GR Sports, the agency of, among others, Maldini’s other son, Daniel.

Lippi’s previous case

The issue of suitability, already raised by the most critical voices in recent hours, recalls a very similar case from the summer of 2016, when former FIGC president Carlo Tavecchio considered Marcello Lippi for the role of technical director of the Italy national team to support head coach Gian Piero Ventura. That idea fell apart once the possible conflict of interest linked to the established agent career of Davide, the son of the former head coach who won the World Cup in 2006, came under scrutiny, forcing him to step aside. Andrea Pirlo and Paolo Maldini could now face the same dilemma, even though formally neither Nicolò nor Christian is currently registered on the list of agents.

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