Pellegrino Matarazzo stood there, still and composed. Brown pants. Black sweater. Arms crossed, one hand to his chin and grey beard. The New Jerseyan looked less like the manager of Real Sociedad, a club that placed in La Liga’s top six for five straight seasons before last year, than a math professor. That’s what he well might have been, had his life taken only a slightly different turn; he graduated from Columbia University with a degree in applied mathematics, after all.
Instead, he was there on Saturday, at the Anoeta Stadium, calmly coaxing his side past Elche, 3-1, pumping a single fist when La Real scored, occasionally waving those arms to push his side further upfield. As if Matarazzo’s being there, as if his team taking yet another lead, was all just a matter of course. Just a big-time manager at a big-time club, doing big-time things.
Since Matarazzo’s appointment on 20 December, La Real have won four of six in La Liga, surging from 16th place to eighth. During that unbeaten run, they have tied Atlético Madrid and regional rivals Athletic Club, and beaten Barcelona, which had won 11 in a row going into that match – and totally dominated Sociedad, it should be said. Matarazzo’s men also advanced through two rounds of the Copa del Rey, and defeated Athletic Club again on Wednesday in the first leg of their semi-final. On Saturday, they travel to Real Madrid.
Yet for his stunning early success – Real Sociedad have now won as many league matches in Matarazzo’s seven weeks in charge as they did in the 17 rounds before – the presence of the American remains remarkable.
Rather awkwardly, after just eight matches, the question can already be asked whether Matarazzo is quietly putting together the most impressive season a US-born coach has ever recorded in Europe.
The son of an Italian Napoli fan, Matarazzo tried his luck as a professional in Italy after four years of college soccer at Columbia, where two of his younger brothers played as well – all three of them earning All-Ivy League honors while there. Pellegrino, who goes by Rino, wound up spending a decade in Germany’s lower leagues before becoming a coach. He was Julian Nagelsmann’s roommate during the German federation’s coaching courses and joined the latter on the staff at Hoffenheim. Matarazzo took over as Stuttgart manager in December of 2019 and got them promoted back to the Bundesliga right away. After getting sacked in late 2022, he returned to Hoffenheim as manager but lasted only 18 months.
Matarazzo had been unemployed for more than a year when he suddenly turned up in San Sebastián, becoming the first American to manage in La Liga.
With an innate intensity and clear tactics that he will not share with the press, the results have come quickly. But Matarazzo has also made himself popular with a studious deference to local culture.
“The first day he came in, the first impression was a bit scary: he’s 6ft 2in and frightening,” captain Mikel Oyarzabal told the Guardian (Matarazzo is actually taller – listed as 6ft 6in). “But he has brought good energy, intensity. We’re on the right path now. He has embraced Donostia, la Real, the Basque Country values from here; coming from the outside, that’s important.”
“The team is very, very special,” Matarazzo said. “I am enjoying this club: the players, the staff. Good characters, great values that I can identify myself with and the city is beautiful too; it’s not a bad place to be right now.”
But if the American appreciates his good fortune in getting this opportunity, he has also been savvy in his approach. To make himself understood to a team that counts only a few non-native Spanish speakers, Matarazzo speaks as much Spanish as he can muster. But when he speaks in English, he provides subtitles to his team talks in all the languages in the locker room, according to goalkeeper Álex Remiro.
Luck has been a factor, too. “There was a little magic in the atmosphere,” Matarazzo said after his side upset Barça on the eve of tamborrada, San Sebastián’s annual festival.
In truth, the distinction of the best American coaching campaign in European club soccer is a niche one. That competition isn’t particularly stiff. Bob Bradley had a checkered record in two stints with Stabæk in Norway, at Le Havre in France, and, very briefly and unhappily, in charge of Swansea City of the Premier League. Gregg Berhalter never got Hammarby promoted to the top-tier Allsvenskan.
The bar to clear is probably the one set by Jesse Marsch in winning back-to-back doubles with Red Bull Salzburg in 2019-20 and 2020-21. But then that Salzburg team was stacked – Erling Haaland scored 28 goals for Marsch in the American’s first half season at the club – and in the middle of a run of 10 straight Austrian league titles. Real Sociedad was in disarray when Matarazzo took over, still smarting from losing Martin Zubimendi to Arsenal last summer.
There is a lot of season left, of course. While only three points separate La Real from sixth-placed Espanyol, sitting in the final European place, it is also a mere nine points removed from the relegation zone with 15 rounds of games left to go.
If La Real stays on anything like the trajectory it has been on, however, Matarazzo will lay down a new marker for his countrymen.
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Leander Schaerlaeckens’ book on the United States men’s national soccer team, The Long Game, is out on 12 May. You can preorder it here. He teaches at Marist University.
