His full name is Manuel Luis
Pellegrini Ripamonti is a Chilean former football player and current football
manager of Manchester City team; Pellegrini was born in September 16, 1953 in
Santiago.
Pellegrini managed teams in
Chile, Argentine, and Spain, he started his coaching career after retiring from
playing football, where he coached in Chile to move then to Argentine, finally
in 2004 he moved to the La Liga to be the coach of Villarreal, which was a
small team with notable history. Though he led them to achieve the third place
in La Liga in the season 2004-2005 and to reach to the semi-final of the
champions League in the 2005-2006 season, then he achieved the second place in
La Liga and broke the domination of the two big teams on the two first places
in La Liga in the season 2007-2008.
Pellegrini was attracted by Real
Madrid according to his results with Villareal, though he signed with Real
Madrid in 2009 to be the Manager of the team in 2009. He could to achieve with
Real Madrid 96 points in La Liga but he lost the title by 3 points with
Barcelona, though he replaced Real Madrid to make contract with Jose Mourinho
in 2011-2012 seasons.
Pellegrini then moved to Malaga
to sign with it in November 2010. He led the team to reach the fourth place in
La Liga and to achieve their qualification for the champion’s league for the
next season. So in the next season the team reached to the quarter final of the
champions league in the 2012-2013 season , and thus Pellegrini becomes the
first coach who led different teams to reach the quarter =finals of the
champions league during his debut season in the competition.
Pellegrini signed with Manchester
City ON June 14, 2013 after leaving Malaga in May 22, 2013.
Playing career:
Pellegrini played professionally
as defender in Universidad de Chile; he appeared in the team with 451 games and
had 7 goals in the Chilean Division 1. Pellegrini stayed with his team until
1984 when he decided to retire at the age of 33.
Managerial Career:
The early years of his coaching
career:
Pellegrini coached in 1988 season
the Universidad de Chile team but he compelled to leave the team in the middle
of the season in order to take courses of couching career in Europe. His team
was weak so he relegated to the division 2, but Pellegrini could in the next
season of 1989 to lead them from achieving the champions of the division 2 and
rising to the division 1.
He became the assistant of the
head manager of the Chilean national football team who was Arturo Salah in 1990
in addition he became the head manager of team under 20-years. He signed with
many teams in the Chilean League starting with Palestino, to move then to
O’Higgins where he stayed there for one year to sign lastly with Universidad Catolica,
which is one of the most popular football teams in Chile. Pellegrini led them
to achieve the Copa Interamericana in 1994 -1995.
Then in 1999, Pellegrini took the
management of Ecuadorian team, where he pushed the team and sported it to give
him a good run in the Libertadores.
San Lorenzo:
Pellegrini signed with San
Lorenzo de Almagro in 2001 leading them to achieve their first title in the
Copa Mercosur.
River Plate:
Pellegrini moved to River Plate
in 2002 as stayed there until 2003 leading them to achieve the Clausura
championship in 2003.
Villarreal:
Pellegrini moved to Spain in
order to sign with Villarreal in July 1, 2004. Pellegrini pushed his new team
Villarreal to achieve the third place in La Liga though they qualified for the champion’s
league for the next year and also they reached to the quarter-final of the UEFA
Cup. So in the 2005-2006 seasons Pellegrini led his team to reach to the
semi-finals of the champion league losing in front Arsenal.
Villarreal finished the La Liga
in the seventh place, but in the next two seasons, Pellegrini pushed them to
reach to the fifth and second place of the La Liga which was historical
achievement for Villarreal, though they reached again to the quarter –final of
the champion’s league and they lost again in front of Arsenal 4-1.
According to the good performance
and the best results of Villarreal under the management of Pellegrini, so they
from 2007 decided to extend his contract until 2011, so he refused Real Madrid
offer claiming that he has contract until 2011 but he signed with them in 2009,
and Real Madrid enforced to pay his termination clause which costs € 4
million.
Real Madrid:
Pellegrini signed with Real
Madrid in June 2, 2009 a contract for two years. Pellegrini bought many players
like Kaka from Milan , Cristiano Ronaldo from Manchester United, Karim Benzema
from Olympique Lyonnais, and Xavi Alonso from Liverpool.
Real Madrid was eliminated from
the Copa Del Ray from the round 16 by team from the division B which was
Alcorcon by 4-1 result.
Real Madrid achieved record 96
points in La Liga but it failed to won the title of the La Liga because its
rival Barcelona ended the league with 99 points. This thing was led to sack
Pellegrini and replaced by Jose Mourinho for the next season. They even lost in
front of Lyon in the champion league from 16 round.
Malaga:
Pellegrini received an offer from
the Mexican national team in July 2010, but he signed with Malaga a contract
for three years, Malaga in the first season finished it in the 4th
place in La Liga with 58 points. So the team qualified for the champion league
for the next year, it was the first time that Malaga qualifies for the champion
league in its history. So Pellegrini led Malaga to reach to the semi-final
place in the champion league but they lost in front of Borussia Dortmund in a
crazy match where Borussia could win the match in the last three minutes
scoring two goals to become the result 3-2.
Manchester City:
Pellegrini signed with Manchester
City on May 30, 2013. So he becomes the first Chilean Coach who managed in the
Primer League, and the fifth coach from outside of Europe to manage an English
Team in the same league.