Enzo Maresca, the midfielder who couldn't speak English and became a trophy-winning coach
He arrived at West Bromwich Albion as a teenager with no grasp of English, and decades later he was steering Chelsea to two major trophies in a single summer. Enzo Maresca's route ran through Juventus, Sevilla and a long apprenticeship beside some of the sport's best-known coaches.
Born on 10 February 1980 in Pontecagnano Faiano, near Salerno, Maresca began at AC Milan aged 11 and moved to Cagliari three years later. His senior debut came for West Brom in a 2–0 home loss to Bradford City in September 1998. In January 2000 Juventus paid £4.3 million for him, then a record sale for the English club. Loans to Bologna and Piacenza followed, and a goal against Torino in the city derby caused a stir when he copied a rival's bull-horn celebration.
His best years came in Spain. Signed by Sevilla in July 2005 for €2.5 million, he scored twice in the 4–0 UEFA Cup final win over Middlesbrough, took the man-of-the-match award and gave his €10,000 prize to a Seville hospital. Sevilla retained that trophy in 2007, and he also collected a UEFA Super Cup, Copa del Rey and Supercopa. Spells at Olympiacos, Málaga, Sampdoria, Palermo, where he won Serie B, and Hellas Verona ended with retirement on his 37th birthday in 2017. He played for Italy's youth sides but never won a senior cap.
Coaching began modestly. Lacking the required badges, he was officially an assistant at Ascoli, then worked under Vincenzo Montella at Sevilla and Manuel Pellegrini at West Ham. Leading Manchester City's development squad brought the Premier League 2 title, but a first head coach job at Parma ended with dismissal in November 2021, and he went back to City to assist Pep Guardiola.
Leicester City hired him in June 2023; he lived at the training ground for two months, won four Manager of the Month awards and secured the Championship title in April 2024. At Chelsea he finished fourth, then beat Real Betis 4–1 to win the Conference League, making Chelsea the only club with all three current main UEFA trophies, and thrashed Paris Saint-Germain 3–0 in the 2025 Club World Cup final. He stepped down on 1 January after tensions with the owners, and in 2026 was named Guardiola's successor at Manchester City.
Source: Enzo Maresca
