Roberto Mancini had a faraway look in his eyes. It was creeping towards midnight on a humid evening in Sicily and, in the creaky old Stadio Renzo Barbera, he was confronting what he called the “unthinkable.”

Italy, his European champions, had just lost 1-0 to a last-minute, breakaway North Macedonia goal, a play-off shock that meant the Azzurri would not be going to the World Cup.

The “unthinkable”, Mancini, Italy’s manager on that night 17 months ago, added, “just happens sometimes in football”. Yet to happen twice in a row to the most decorated World Cup nation in Europe seemed to concentrate a heavy cargo of misfortune into a very short time.

“Good luck has turned to bad luck,” Mancini said of the steep ups and downs in his time in charge of his native national team. His Italy became European champions in June 2021; they were World Cup flops less than a year later. “The greatest disappointment of my career,” he called the ambush by North Macedonia.

The job Mancini is now ushered into, as manager of Saudi Arabia, comes with the realistic hope that, after his many varied experiences as a manager, he will finally be involved at a World Cup finals.

A major impact at the 2026 event in North and Central America is a clear target for the federation that has lured Mancini, who in his 36 caps for Italy as player never got closer to World Cup action than the substitutes’ bench and who, through 61 games as Italy manager until his resignation earlier this month, could not arrest a pattern of underachievement.

Since winning the tournament for the fourth time in 2006, the Azzurri have suffered two group-stage eliminations and two successive failures to qualify at all.

Saudi Arabia, home of the biggest-spending league in Asia, have the same overall record over the past four World Cups. But they beat Argentina in Qatar to begin their most recent excursion to a finals and Mancini sees a wide platform for progress.

“It’s time to make history with Saudi,” he declared on the announcement of his three-year contract with the Green Falcons, referencing the positive history he had made with Italy: the triumph at the last European championship.

For their reported €25 million-a-year investment in Mancini, the Saudi Arabian Federation have a coach born to the métier. As a footballer, he was a prodigy, debuting in Serie A as a 16-year-old, and, because of his astute reading of the game from his position just off the main striker, he became a tactical sounding board for the coaches he played under from an unusually early age.

By the time he was at a history-making Sampdoria team in the 1990s, he was much more than simply a senior pro. When the Swede Sven Goran Eriksson was interviewed to become Sampdoria’s manager, he was surprised to see Mancini, still a player, on the panel assessing him.

Mancini and Eriksson would become lifelong friends and allies, though Eriksson always recognised a stubborn streak in Mancini, who fell out with more than one Italy national coach during his playing career. He has never been a pushover for his employers in a 22-year, much-medalled career in management, either.

As a novice coach at clubs who had suffered abrupt financial setbacks, Fiorentina and Lazio, he overachieved by delivering Cup trophies. With the deeper resources available at Inter Milan, he won successive Italian league titles and would deliver an epoch-defining first Premier League title for Manchester City during his three and a half rollercoaster seasons there.

As with Italy, the good times at City – the last-gasp Sergio Aguero goal to claim the title on the last match day of the 2011-12 campaign – were exhilarating, and the lows – an FA Cup final defeat to Wigan Athletic – close to “unthinkable”.

His passage through club football, including stints at Galatasaray, where he won a Turkish Cup, and Zenit Saint Petersburg, speak of a relish for fresh challenges. After returning for an unfulfilling second spell at Inter, he spent five years at the helm of Italy, where, despite his thrilling peak and the brave, vibrant side he built to conquer the Euros, he felt the frustrations of international management, often complaining that Serie A, with its spread of imported players, was limiting opportunities for Italian players to raise their level.

He arrives in Riyadh mindful of similar potential issues. While the soaring profile of the Pro League, now a powerful magnet for foreign superstars, provides clear benefits for elite football in Saudi Arabia, Mancini is anxious that key players for his medium and long-term plans find the space to develop in their club football.

Will the signing of Aleksandar Mitrovic by Al Hilal be a benefit for national team prospect Abdullah Al Hamdan or a restriction on how much Al Hamdan plays? Will Abdulrahman Ghareeb continue to be deemed the best complement to Cristiano Ronaldo and Sadio Mane in the Al Nassr forward line or the first to drop out of the starting XI in any tactical adjustment?

In a rapidly changing football landscape, the questions for the ambitious, illustrious new Saudi national coach are many.

Updated: August 29, 2023, 2:40 AM