Decoding Diego Simeone : The Pantomime Hero
There is one man in European Football who defies the odds when it comes to destroying preconceived notions. Just like his team. The football world rates managers depending on the trophies and how everything they touch have turned to gold. But Simeone hasn’t turned his team into gold, but iron. As he himself once exclaimed- “I thank the mothers of my players for giving them balls of iron”, a memorable quote after winning the 2013–14 La Liga over a grueling 38 match season against FC Barcelona and Real Madrid who have been the flag bearers of Spanish football for decades.
Diego Simeone can be understood by anyone who loves football. He is pure passion, football fury and veins of steel combined into one. Sure, using innumerable adjectives to outlandishly praise a manager is odd when he isn’t the one stepping onto the field and performing for his team. But ironically in Simeone’s case, it is. When his team plays, you see 11 Simeones walking around wearing the veil of impenetrable armor of self-confidence and vigor only seen when international teams fight for World Cup qualification. Such is his philosophy that when you put mind and heart to an objective, no matter who your opposition is, no matter what your team’s budget is, no matter what history says, if you leave your sweat and blood on the field — more often than not you end up winning the match or trophy or whatever you set your mind to.
He is often branded as “El Cholo” — a word which was previously used as an ethnic slur referring to a “country” or “hick” person. Anyone would have wanted to avoid that nickname in this tech savvy world. But Simeone embraces it. He embraces the very definition of that word. He wants to be the underdog who everyone wants to beat but cannot beat. He wants himself and his team to be portrayed as giant killers rather than favorites. He is the epitome of passive aggressive demeanor - which he often displays along the touch line when his players don’t give their one hundred percent. But make no mistake, he never ever criticizes his player even for teeny bit in his press conferences and interviews. All he does, his ramblings, his curses, his instructions he does in behind closed doors and among his trusted group of assistants and players — which is unanimously everyone at his club. Every player wants to be under his leadership and succeed as a unit rather than be an individual spark and take the team over the line — a feat which is rarely achieved by today’s managers.
Simeone wasn’t bred from glamour and paparazzi. He was embroiled in the Atléti system having been a credible player for them over the years before retiring and moving into a managerial career. Simeone won Estudiantes de La Plata their first league title in 23 years after defeating Boca Juniors 2–1 in the final match. By then, Argentina started knowing more about the new guy in the town. The sports daily Olé awarded Simeone as the best manager in the Argentine league. He was getting ready.
History may say his two Champions League finals against Real Madrid in 2014 and 2016 are his best achievements. But his best achievement till he outdoes it has to be the league title which he won in 2014. Journalists in Spain were shocked to see that such a brute, direct and well organized team could hold out attack after attack for 90 minutes, match after match for 38 weeks straight with a far lesser budget the country’s two biggest teams and come unscathed with a league title at the end. Real Madrid lost the race two weeks before the final match week. Barcelona had pulled along until the final match day only to draw at home and concede the league title to their rivals from a city which was known for housing their more glitterati occupied arch rivals — Real Madrid. A new sense of belonging had begun all over Europe, that teams can win no matter what the papers and pundits say. Leicester City wrote an even more incomprehensible chapter by winning the Premier League in 2016 against 19 other teams which were financially superior to them and historically more established than them. The story of the underdogs was written. But the seed was planted by Diego “El Cholo” Simeone. Claudio Ranieri had made the sense of belonging even bigger, denser and intense.
Atléti reached the final of the Champions League again that year bearing in mind the heart break Real Madrid had bestowed upon them 2 years ago. They fell short again. But it didn’t matter to Atlético Madrid and their supporters. A man had brought back the rigorous paraphernalia needed to make their club a force to be reckoned by the whole continent. Simeone sent Barça out of the Champions League for two consecutive seasons. He has defeated Mourinho in the Supercup when he was at Real Madrid and then in the UEFA Supercup when José Mourinho was at Chelsea. He had thumped Real Madrid 4 nil at the Vicente Calderón and made the Rojiblancos believe they were a match for their city rivals. Players like Griezmann, Diego Costa, Koke, Oblak started becoming A list players associated to Atléti and big name players wanted to play for Atlético de Madrid.
And as the dawn of May 17th, 2018 started nearing closer, El Cholo was celebrating with his men of steel, yet another trophy, the Europa League leaving them in contention to play yet another UEFA Supercup final in a couple of months.
The last time a manager had left such an effect on football was when the unknown Sir Alex Ferguson stepped in and tied his laces to embrace on what what would be the greatest managerial career ever.
All this, because a man from Argentina believed that you cannot lose as long as you played with the belief that you had won nothing.
