Football Food For Thought / Dan Fitch / 29 December 2009 /

First it was the Americans with their chewing gum and nylons, now it is the Italians who are over here and over-exposed. Dan 'The Betting Man' Fitch looks at the merits of Capello, Zola, Ancelotti and Mancini.

Stereotyping is not always a negative thing. For every lazy joke about the Irish being thick, there is a preconceived notion that the French are sophisticated, just because they shrug a lot and eat thinner chips than us with their steaks.

Along with the French, the other nation in Europe that are viewed as being sophisticated, are the Italians. What's more, we also tend to attribute to them a hint of danger, which comes from us having watched a few too many episodes of The Sopranos.

Italian football managers are currently benefiting from their reputation as sophisticates, by snapping up some of the top jobs in the Premier League.

It doesn't matter that sometimes their managerial record is a bit shaky, when they can boast of possessing several Armani suits on their CV. Italian managers are always going to seem a better option than their British counterpart, when the likes of Tony Pulis dress as if they've got a permanent 10% discount at Sports Direct.

There are currently three Italian managers plying their trade in the Premier League, which is a startling statistic when you consider that there are only seven English managers competing at the top level of our game.

It's all down to Fabio Capello. He was selected as England manager, due to the quality of his achievements and the fact that Steve McClaren's reign had quite rightly scared the FA from taking another punt on a mid-level English boss.

So far all the signs suggest that Capello is doing as good a job as could possibly be expected. He understands that England's best chance of actually winning something is to get the best out of Wayne Rooney and is even prepared to pick Emile Heskey to facilitate this. England are currently available at a jingoistic [7.0] to win the World Cup.

Capello's success has led to some Premier League chairman copying the FA's recruiting policy, with a typical lack of imagination.

The chief beneficiary of this craze has been Gianfranco Zola, who was given the West Ham job despite his lack of managerial experience. It's true that he was a Premiership great, but so was Dennis Bergkamp and no English club is queuing up to give him a job.

With very little money to spend, West Ham are great value at [4.3] to be relegated. Zola has a very difficult job on his hands to keep the Hammers up and there's nothing to suggest that he has the know-how to pull it off.

At the top of the league there's Carlo Ancelotti at Chelsea. Though he can boast of a more impressive track record than Zola, there are still doubts as to whether he's the man to guide Chelsea to another league title.

Ancelotti won two Champions Leagues during his eight years at Milan, but one Serie A title was a poor return. Chelsea are currently top of the league and available at [2.04] to win the title, but there's no reason to believe that an experienced British manager such as Martin O'Neill or Harry Redknapp couldn't do a similar job to Ancelotti.

The newest Italian recruit is Roberto Mancini at Manchester City. He has pedigree as a manger having won three Serie A titles with Inter, albeit in an era that saw Juventus relegated and Milan punished for match fixing.

City are now [2.6] to finish in the top four, after Mancini has enjoyed successive wins in the Premier League. He certainly looks the part, but only time will tell if Mancini is capable of bringing success to Eastlands, or is just another expensive Italian takeaway.

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