AC Milan chose Paulo Fonseca as their new head coach because of what he is today and what he showed in his last job at Lille, but his origins are very much in his home country Portugal.
As La Gazzetta dello Sport recall, the legend of Arrigo Sacchi’s Milan began with the fog that descended on Belgrade in 1988. In that particular match Milan were trailing in the second half of the second leg of a European Cup tie but the game was abandoned, replayed and the Rossoneri won.
Fonseca, in his small way, lived a similar story. In the 2012-13 campaign, he was in charge of Pacos de Ferreira who were drawing 0-0 at home with Estoril, when the fog descended. The last 13 minutes were postponed to the next day .
Half an hour before entering the stadium, Fonseca called the team to the training pitch and drew up a scheme as seen in basketball. The game was won, and Pacos qualified for the Champions League preliminaries.
Fonseca was chosen by Milan for his work ethic, his proactive football, his willingness to work with the players at his disposal without asking for the moon in terms of investment in young players. This is an attitude that stems from his youth.
In 2011, he was coaching in the Portuguese C league at Pinhalnovense, not far from Lisbon, and to make ends meet he ran a pastry shop and a shoe shop. One summer evening, almost midnight, he received a call.
Armando Silva, then president of Aves, recalls: “Marco Abreu, my sporting director, and I had just had dinner with the coach chosen for the following season. A disappointment. On the return trip we made a few calls, they pointed out Paulo and invited him to lunch.
“Thirteen hours later, he showed up with a dossier with the profiles of all the players, their strengths and weaknesses. Considering the hours of travel, it’s clear he hadn’t slept to prepare.” He was Hired.
Silva, thirteen years later, is still in contact with Fonseca: “In difficult times, Paulo insists on his principles. A flaw? He must learn to ask more from his clubs, when necessary.”
His start at Desportivo Aves was traumatic. Vasco Matos, who now coaches Santa Clara, played under Fonseca hthere: “The preparation was a shock. The second division in Portugal was long ball and running, he arrived and changed everything: training only with the ball, positional football, the game controlled with possession. He talked a lot and we all ended up thinking like him.”
Leandro Pires, now Matos’ assistant, was also in that team: “Paulo was the first to get out of a military approach; sometimes, to form a group, he took us karting. The two-month rule applies to him. You have to give him July and August because at the beginning the team struggles to understand his requests. Then he changes.”
Fonseca almost got Aves promoted to and this convenced Paços de Ferreira. In his first year with them he drove a Citroen C2 and earned €5,000 net per month. His only goal was for them to avoid relegation, but then that run to third in the league came.
They made the Champions League qualifiers as mentioned before, which they lost to Zenit when Fonseca was already at Porto. He stayed with them for nine months and they were not easy, but Pinto da Costa did not buy anyone to back him.
The truth is that Fonseca still had his heart in Paços, where with the money from the Champions League they were building a stand, known to all as the ‘Fonseca stand’, a small structure dedicated to the person who brought the UEFA prize money.
Fonseca was there last month because his first wife and first two children live in the city. The family of his current wife, former press officer of the owner of Shakhtar, too. Paulo helped them leave Ukraine and suggested staying in the area, where people come for the furniture, not for tourism.
The Portuguese returned to coaching in 2014, after a bad year at Porto. He had a rich offer from Qatar but chose Paços again. President Paulo Menezed recalls: “I met him in Fatima and agreed to pay him double the first time, 10,000 euros a month. He told me: ‘OK, I want to start being happy again’.”
Paços came within a step of Europe and Fonseca’s climb began again: Braga, Shakhtar, Roma, Lille and now Milan. RedBird Capital chose him for his coaching ideas but also the person he is. Miguel Socorro, former general manager of Paços, makes a prediction: “The youngsters with him will also have a chance at Milan. I know he likes some of them.”
The pastry shop and the C2 are certainly no longer there, replaced by other passions: horses above all, then shoes, clothes, charity through a friend in Mozambique. His boys at Aves say that at the time he always said that the key to everything was balance.
