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Manuel Luis Pellegrini Ripamonti is a Chilean professional football manager and former footballer and is the head coach of Chinese Super League side Hebei China Fortune. As a coach, he has managed teams in Spain, England, Argentina, Chile and Ecuador. A qualified civil engineer and former footballer, after retiring as a player, he moved into coaching in his native Chile and subsequently Argentina. Pellegrini has won national leagues in four different countries.
Pellegrini moved to Europe in 2004 to take the manager's post at Villarreal, a club near Valencia. Under Pellegrini, Villarreal achieved a third-place finish in La Liga in 2004-05, a Champions League semi-final in 2005-06 and broke the big two in 2008 by securing a second-place finish in La Liga in 2007-08.
Pellegrini's consistent record at Villarreal attracted the attention of Real Madrid and he was appointed manager there in 2009. He amassed a total of 96 points, a club record until it was surpassed by José Mourinho in the 2011-12 season, but lost the title to Barcelona by three points. He was dismissed after one season and later lamented the Galácticos policy employed at Real which prevented him from building a balanced team.
Pellegrini took up the manager's role at Málaga in November 2010. He led Málaga to a fourth-place finish in his first full season and to qualification for the UEFA Champions League. He made it to the quarter-finals of the 2012-13 Champions League, becoming the only coach to take two different teams to the Champions League quarter-finals in their debut seasons in the competition. On 22 May 2013, Pellegrini confirmed he would leave Málaga at the end of the 2012-13 La Liga season. On 14 June 2013, he was appointed manager of Manchester City F.C., and won the Football League Cup and Premier League in his first season as manager, in the process becoming the first manager from outside Europe to manage a team to the English Premier League title. The title winning season was also noted for goal scoring prowess with Manchester City scoring 151 goals in all competitions - an English football record.
Born in Santiago, to Italian parents, Pellegrini attended the Pontifical Catholic University of Chile in Santiago, where he graduated in civil engineering in 1979. He started his formative years as a footballer in the youth divisions of Audax Italiano, then he went to the Club Universidad de Chile and he went on to play professionally for them as a defender. He spent his entire playing career with the club, making a total of 451 appearances and scoring seven goals in the Chilean Division 1, including one goal against Colo-Colo, Universidad de Chile's biggest rival.
In the 1970s, Club Universidad de Chile was going through one of the most unsuccessful periods in its history, not having won the national Copa Chile championship since 1969. That changed in 1979, when the club managed win the championship and secure a place in the South American club championship, the Copa Libertadores, in 1980, defeating its arch-rival Colo-Colo in both tournaments.
Pellegrini decided to retire as a player in 1984 after a match against Cobreandino. He explained: "We were playing in the Copa Chile against Cobreandino. Our goalkeeper parried the shot of a rival player, I jumped to clear the ball, and from behind me came a 17-year-old boy who jumped half a meter above me, and scored. That day I decided I couldn't keep going". That boy was Iván Zamorano, who was the Pichichi of La Liga in 1995 with Real Madrid. Pellegrini confessed: "If I had known where that boy would get, I would not have retired. I would have kept playing two more years."
Pellegrini wanted to help reconstruction projects in the Chilean central zone after the 1985 Algarrobo earthquake knowing that his experience as a qualified civil engineer would be ideal.
As a coach Pellegrini has primarily managed teams in Spain, Argentina and Chile. As in his career as a professional player, he also started off coaching Universidad de Chile during the 1988 season, but left the team at the middle of the season to take football coaching courses in Europe. The team's poor performance that year led to a relegation to the Division 2, though in 1989 they won the Division 2 championship, bringing them back to Division 1, where they have remained ever since.
In 1990, Arturo Salah was appointed as the manager of the Chilean national team, and he hired Pellegrini as his assistant coach and manager of the under-20 team. In 1990, Pellegrini was appointed manager of Palestino, where he stayed until 1992. Then, in 1992, he took on managership of O'Higgins for a year, before moving in 1993 to become coach of Universidad Católica, one of the most popular clubs in Chile. There he managed well-known players such as Alberto Acosta and Nestor Gorosito and took the team to victory in the prestigious Copa Interamericana in 1994 and the 1995 Copa Chile, though he could only finish as runner-up in 1994 and 1995 of the local Campeonato Nacional championship, a competition organized by the Chilean Football Federation in parallel to Division 1.
In 1998, Pellegrini had a brief spell back at Palestino before he was bought by Liga Deportiva Universitaria de Quito. He managed the Ecuadorian club to a national title in 1999, starting a tradition of coaches that followed him to the Ecuadorian team. Pellegrini also gave the club a good run in the Copa Libertadores, catching the eye of other South American managers.
On 1 June 2009, Pellegrini was appointed as manager of Real Madrid, signing a two-year contract. On being presented at the presidential balcony of the Santiago Bernabéu, he said, "Hard to say in a few words the excitement and pride that one feels for having been chosen to direct perhaps the most important club in the world." He joined Real Madrid as the first manager in Florentino Pérez's second stint as Real Madrid president. After a few days, Pellegrini bought Kaká from Milan, saying, "If we want to win the Champions League and be the best team in the world, we need the best players in the world." They later bought Cristiano Ronaldo for £80 million from Manchester United F.C., Karim Benzema from Olympique Lyonnais for £30 million, and Xabi Alonso for £30 million from Liverpool F.C..
On 30 May 2013, Pellegrini stated he had a verbal agreement to become the new manager of Premier League club Manchester City. On 14 June 2013, Manchester City confirmed Pellegrini's appointment as their new first team manager on a three-year contract. Pellegrini was quoted saying he was "delighted to accept this hugely exciting opportunity." Upon joining Manchester City, Pellegrini became only the fifth coach from outside of Europe to manage in the Premier League, and the first Chilean.
Pellegrini initially made a shaky start with four league losses by the end of November but big wins against Newcastle United, Manchester United and Norwich City showed the team's potential. After their fourth league loss against Sunderland on 10 November 2013, City went on 20 match unbeaten streak (in all competitions) which including a 6-0 win over Tottenham Hotspur, a 3-2 win away at European champions Bayern Munich and a 6-3 win over league leaders Arsenal.
On 27 August 2016, Pellegrini was named manager of Chinese Super League club Hebei China Fortune, replacing Li Tie. He took charge of his first match on 10 September 2016 in a home game against Guangzhou Evergrande, which Hebei lost 3-0.
