Napoli supremo Aurelio De Laurentiis has revealed he wanted to hire Max Allegri before he chose Luciano Spalletti to become his team’s manager.

Allegri was out of a job from 2019 to 2021 before he returned to Juventus at the start of last season.

When he was away, several clubs looked to make him their manager as one of the best in the Italian business.

Napoli was one of them and De Laurentiis confirms via Football Italia:

“In the meantime, to throw everyone off the scent I went through Conceicao, through Allegri who came four times to give me football lessons in my office and then in the end it was the good Luciano who brought us back among the top three in Italy and even that year, last year, something different could have happened.”

Juve FC Says

Juve is lucky to have brought Allegri back for free because he is one of the best men in the business.

The gaffer had won five league titles in his first spell as the club’s manager, so he could have gone anywhere before we returned to add him to our squad.

His second spell hasn’t been as successful as the first one, but there are clear signs of improvement now and we expect things to get even better in the next campaign.