In the end, Real Madrid chose the comfortable route, the path of least resistance, and that’s not necessarily a bad thing.
Extending Carlo Ancelotti’s deal, which was due to expire on June 30, 2024, by another two seasons means, above all, playing the percentages. You know what you get and what you get is dependable, popular and stress-free.
You get a guy who, in four full seasons at the Bernabeu, has delivered a league title, two Spanish Cups and two Champions League crowns (plus a bunch of other baubles, as outlined in the club statement) and who is well-placed to add to that silverware this season. (Wednesday night’s 1-0 win over Mallorca keeps them top of LaLiga over Girona on goal difference.)
You get a guy with the special superpower of connecting with superstars, from Cristiano Ronaldo to Karim Benzema in years past, through to Vinícius and Toni Kroos today. Not all of them at once, and not all the time, but a darn sight more of that quality than most of his peers. There’s no point having a collection of Galacticos if they’re underperforming or sulking in the corner.
You get a guy who is a self-described “company man” and will wear that badge with pride. He won’t call out his players or the club in public — and he won’t get his friends in the media to do so in private, either. He works with what he has available to him and doesn’t moan about “not getting backed by the club.”
Heck, even now, with a fresh new deal in his pocket, he reckons that despite losing his first-choice center-backs Eder MIlitao and David Alaba for the rest of the season, he’s fine competing on three fronts (LaLiga, Champions League, Copa del Rey) for the rest of the year with Nacho (who turns 34 next month) and Antonio Rüdiger, while Aurélien Tchouaméni and Dani Carvajal — neither of whom has played much in central defence — serve as the alternates.
Ancelotti may be a model manager, but he’s a model employee too, and you wonder to what degree that played into club president Florentino Perez’s thinking here.
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Other than three years between 2006 and 2009, Perez has been in continuous charge since 2000. There have been missteps and hiccups under his stewardship, but his legacy as one of the club’s two greatest presidents — the other being Santiago Bernabeu, as in the stadium — is secure. It’s not just the six European Cups during his tenure (equalling Bernabeu), but the way he navigated the club’s transition from a sporting/cultural giant to a sporting/cultural/business/entertainment giant.
However, it’s also evident that there’s another major priority in Perez’s life, beyond Real Madrid and his day job (as chairman and biggest shareholder of Grupo ACS, a construction juggernaut with $30 billion in revenue): upending UEFA’s role as regulator and organizer of Europe’s club competitions, like the Champions League. He was the driving force behind the 2021 aborted Super League rebellion; he, together with Barcelona, brought the legal challenge that led to the European Court of Justice ruling, and he’s unlikely to give up anytime soon.
Florentino however turns 77 in March and while his drive and enthusiasm show no signs of abating, there are only so many hours in the day and only so much energy you can expend. Transitioning away from Ancelotti at the end of this season would have meant opening up a giant can of time-suck and uncertainty — the sort that he could probably do without at this time.
First and foremost, there would have been the choice of Ancelotti’s replacement. The most talked-about candidates were the in-house club legend — Raul, who has been in charge of the club’s B-team, Castilla, since 2019 — or Xabi Alonso, the club legend who made his fortune elsewhere and is tearing it up in the Bundesliga with Bayer Leverkusen.
Promoting from within worked great with Zinedine Zidane, sure, but would lightning strike twice? And do Raul’s four-and-a-half years at Castilla in the third flight (with underwhelming results) somehow undermine him?
Xabi Alonso would undoubtedly be the more exciting choice, but he’d also represent a genuine sea change in footballing approach. Schooled by both Jose Mourinho and Pep Guardiola — a Venn diagram that’s tough to replicate — his football vision is much closer to the latter. Would it work “off the shelf” at the Bernabeu, a place where results are first-and-foremost and the last “visionary” manager was probably Benito Floro some 30 years ago? Would it require reshaping the squad? Would Florentino need to be sucked into a PR job of preaching patience?
Given the global trend in football, Xabi Alonso would likely have been the smart choice for the Florentino of 20 years ago, but today’s Florentino? Maybe not. Maybe the safe pair of hands is the better option.
Then there’s the man-management angle. Both Raul and Xabi Alonso were established superstars, but neither has ever worked with them. It’s one thing to persuade a bunch of youngsters (and Granit Xhaka) to buy into your plan when you’re flying near the top of the Bundesliga and playing in front of 30,000 at the BayArena. It’s quite another to connect with a Vinícius Júnior or a Toni Kroos when it’s 0-0 in the second half at the Bernabeu, in front of 90,000 fans waving white hankies.
Not to mention the recruitment angle. Rightly or wrongly, persuading Kylian Mbappé to join in the summer is that little bit easier when you have a known quantity like Ancelotti than it is with a new boss who has never worked at this level.
And speaking of recruitment, who’s going to be more on board with trying to squeeze one more season out of Kroos, Luka Modric and/or Nacho (assuming that’s what the club want to do, perhaps in lieu of spending more money on young players)? Who’s more likely to accept another season of Joselu as his back-up center-forward? I think we know the answer.
There’s also a practical factor. If Ancelotti doesn’t work out and the club feel they need to make a change next season or the one after that, it would likely be relatively painless. He’s made it clear this is his last club job, meaning he won’t pop up somewhere else to haunt you.
And that works from Ancelotti’s perspective too, by the way. There’s a World Cup in 2026, shortly after his new deal expires. He said it was “exciting to think about” possibly managing Brazil (if they still want him). Or maybe Italy. Or maybe Canada, where he has a home. Who knows?
The more you think about it, the more it’s obvious: this decision to extend was easy. Maybe, from a bird’s eye view, this would have been the perfect opportunity to turn the page and rebuild a young, aggressive side with a young, aggressive manager. You’ll have to transition at some point, why not now?
But decisions are made by humans, and it’s humans who then have to carry them out. Perez and Ancelotti are both human, and they’ve earned the right to do what feels comfortable to them at the stage they’re at in their lives. Especially since, if it doesn’t work out, they’ll be the ones responsible.