In 1991, Sarri moved on to Faellese, another small Tuscan team were playing in the division above Stia – in Italy’s seventh tier. Within two seasons he would win them promotion. Andrea Buset and Simone Simonti played as midfielders.
Andrea Buset
Maurizio had a number of different superstitions. Firstly there was the smoking. He was always smoking. Nowadays you can’t smoke on the bench; back then you could. He would put one cigarette out and then light up another straight away.
And he was always dressed in black. He only stopped that relatively recently – he dressed like that at all his old teams. It was his lucky colour.
When we were winning games he would always repeat the exact same rituals. He would take the same route to the stadium, he would dress the same, he would put one particular foot in front of the other, that sort of thing.
Simone Simonti
We knew everything about our opponents, and I mean everything – technical details, tactics, information on individual players. For that time it was unthinkable that a coach at our level would have that amount of information on another team.
Under Maurizio we played a 3-5-2, with zonal marking. We were the only team at that level who played football like that. At that time it was the dawn of zonal play, which in Italy began with Arrigo Sacchi at AC Milan. Maurizio did the same with us.
It was a template, a mould for ‘SarriBall’. Twenty-five years ago we were already using the same tactics at corners and free-kicks that Maurizio has since brought up the leagues.
His great strength was in creating a group that were friends as well as team-mates. He was able to get the best out of every player and motivate each individual. To this day, we still get together as a team and go out for dinner because we have all stayed friends.
Make no mistake – he would get angry very often, but they were fits of rage that would always bring about something positive. They were not outbursts that would leave a negative mark on the dressing room. It was all about constructive criticism.
He is able to bring joy to the surface. And you see that express itself on a matchday.