Luigi Delneri

Luigi Delneri

Personal information
Full name	Luigi Delneri
Date of birth	(1950-08-23) 23 August 1950
Place of birth	Aquileia, Italy
Position(s)	Midfielder
Senior career*
Years	Team	Apps	(Gls)
1967–1968	Aquileia
1968–1972	SPAL	66	(0)
1972–1974	Foggia	51	(5)
1974–1975	Novara	33	(1)
1975–1978	Foggia	92	(6)
1978–1980	Udinese	59	(7)
1980–1981	Sampdoria	33	(1)
1981–1982	Vicenza	31	(4)
1982–1983	Siena	24	(1)
1983–1984	Pro Gorizia	32	(8)
1984–1985	Opitergina
Managerial career
1985–1986	Opitergina
1986–1989	Pro Gorizia
1989–1990	Partinicaudace
1990–1991	Teramo
1991–1992	Ravenna
1992–1994	Novara
1994–1996	Nocerina
1996–1998	Ternana
1998	Empoli
1998–1999	Ternana
2000–2004	Chievo Verona
2004	Porto
2004–2005	Roma
2005–2006	Palermo
2006–2007	Chievo Verona
2007–2009	Atalanta
2009–2010	Sampdoria
2010–2011	Juventus
2012–2013	Genoa
2015–2016	Hellas Verona
*Club domestic league appearances and goals

Luigi "Gigi" Delneri, often incorrectly written as Del Neri (born 23 August 1950) is an Italian football manager, last coach of Hellas Verona.

Playing career

Born at Aquileia, province of Udine, Delneri made his professional debut as player at the age of 16 for Spal, Ferrara's football team, for which he had worked as storer. After playing for Foggia and Novara, he moved to Udinese, with whom he gained promotion to Serie A, Italy's top division. He was later traded to Sampdoria, and then to Lanerossi Vicenza, Siena, Pro Gorizia and Opitergina, an amateur team from Oderzo, where he ended his playing career at 34.

Coaching career

After his retirement as a player, Delneri stayed at Oderzo, appointed by chairman Ettore Setten (now owner of Treviso) as head coach. In 1986 he signed for Serie D team Pro Gorizia. He then coached Partinicaudace, a minor Sicilian Serie D team, in 1989, Teramo, Ravenna, Novara and Nocerina of Serie C2; with this last team he won the league and promotion to Serie C1. He then moved to Ternana of Serie C2, guiding it to Serie B after two consecutive promotions.

In 1998, after his second consecutive promotion, he was signed by Empoli of Serie A, but was fired before starting the championship, and was then recalled by his former team Ternana at the Serie B level.

In 2000 he signed with Chievo Verona of Serie B, a team representing a small quarter of Verona. It was the beginning of the so-called "Chievo miracle", in which the team was promoted for the very first time to Serie A and then even qualified for the UEFA Cup in its first season at the highest level of Italian football, after leading Serie A at the end of the winter break.

In the summer of 2004, Delneri was signed by Champions' League holders FC Porto, but, as with Empoli, was fired before making his debut. He maintained that he wanted to return to Italy for personal reasons. Signed in October 2004 by AS Roma, replacing Rudi Völler, he in turn left this position in March 2005 after a dismaying series of defeats, which were regarded as only partially the fault of Delneri.

In mid-2005 he accepted the offer of US Palermo to coach the Sicilian team, which had also qualified for the UEFA Cup. After a good beginning, including a surprising 3–2 win against Inter Milan and qualification to the UEFA Cup group stages, the team started producing poor results, slowly losing position in the Serie A table. After a 3–1 defeat at home against Siena, Delneri was fired on 28 January 2006.

On 16 October 2006, Delneri returned to coach Chievo Verona, replacing Giuseppe Pillon. Despite a good start, he did not manage to save his side from relegation, losing a spot in the following season's Serie A with a 2–0 loss to Catania on the final match day. Following the relegation, Delneri announced he was going to leave Chievo. He was announced as new Atalanta boss in June 2007. Delneri spent two successful seasons with Atalanta in which he led the team to 9th and 11th place, which can be seen as a great success since the team fell to 18th place and were demoted to Serie B after his departure. After two seasons in Bergamo, he left to take over at Sampdoria on 1 June 2009, a team that had a disappointing season in which they finished 13th. He guided Sampdoria to a surprising fourth place in which they beat Italian teams F.C. Internazionale Milano, AC Milan, Juventus F.C., and AS Roma, and as a result of the fourth-place finish, Sampdoria received a spot to the third qualifying round of the 2010–11 UEFA Champions League. Delneri left the blucerchiati the day after his team secured fourth place.

On 19 May 2010, Delneri was appointed as coach of Juventus after he quit as coach of Sampdoria on 17 May 2010. On the day of his appointment, Delneri stated,"I want to build a team with a definite identity, that doesn't change depending on which team it is playing," Delneri said. "We want to return to the level that Juventus has always played throughout its century and recreate a winning mentality. I've won some hard challenges and it isn't easy, but it has allowed me to be considered by a big club," Delneri said. "I know full well that we need a lot of quality to achieve our aims. But we need continuity and if we achieve that we might be able to reach our goals earlier. After a slow start to the new season, the Turin side kept their first clean sheet since October in a 4–0 win over Udinese. He guided Juventus to third place in the league before the winter break, however since the new year Juventus have lost 7 of their 11 games. AC Milan beat Juventus 1–0 in Turin on 5 March; this was the third straight defeat for Juventus, which has led to fans calling for his resignation.

At the end of the 2010–11 season Delneri was sacked by the Juventus board.

On 22 October 2012, Delneri was named new head coach of Genoa in Serie A succeeding sacked coach Luigi De Canio.

On 20 January 2013, Delneri was sacked from Genoa following the 0–2 home loss to Catania and a string of bad results for the team finding only two wins in his 13 matches long tenure at the club.

On 1 December 2015, Delneri was appointed manager of Hellas Verona replacing Andrea Mandorlini. He was let go after the season ended in relegation on 23 May 2016.

Managerial statistics

As of 15 May 2016..

Team	From	To	Record
			G	W	D	L	Win %
Chievo	1 July 2001	1 July 2004	154	65	48	41	42.21
Porto	1 July 2004	7 August 2004	0	0	0	0	!—
Roma	29 September 2004	13 March 2005	31	11	8	12	35.48
Palermo	1 July 2005	29 January 2006	31	11	11	9	35.48
Chievo	16 October 2006	30 June 2007	36	9	13	14	25.00
Atalanta	1 July 2007	30 June 2009	79	26	20	33	32.91
Sampdoria	1 June 2009	17 May 2010	40	20	10	10	50.00
Juventus	19 May 2010	23 May 2011	50	20	19	11	40.00
Genoa	22 October 2012	20 January 2013	13	2	2	9	15.38
Hellas Verona	1 December 2015	23 May 2016	26	6	7	13	23.08
Total				170	138	152	37.12

Honours

Coach

Individual

• Serie A Coach of the Year (1): 2001–02
• Panchina d'Oro (1): 2001–02