today 14:40 | The Slovak national football team has a new coach. Truly non-standard, truly Slovak. On Friday morning, the Italian Francesco Calzona officially presented himself to the public for the first time. The first to speak was the president of the Slovak Football Association (SFZ), Ján Kováčik, and revealed how they came to the new head coach, who had never been a head coach before. Read also The new coach of Slovakia, Francesco Calzona, was immediately determined: I want to do… Calzona: Marek and I are friends. But I was chosen by the union “8. In June, I received an audio message from Marek Hamšík. He said he preferred to do it that way because if he wrote it, it would be long. He said his personal opinion, which we then began to develop, that we should choose the path of a foreign coach. On the basis that he knows what he’s talking about. He was in the national team for a long time and worked almost his entire professional career abroad, mainly in Italy. With the fact that if we are interested in this opinion, to meet and try to talk about it,” said Kováčik about the tip from the former captain of the national team. Calzona worked with Hamšík at Napoli from 2015-18 when he was Maurizio Sarri’s assistant. “We have a wonderful relationship with Marek, we are friends. I am very glad that he recommended me. But the Slovak Football Association chose me, not Marek Hamšík. He was just an intermediary,” Calzona said. Kováčik: Calzona has been working for SFZ since July Kováčik met with Hamšík and vice-president Karol Belaník after returning from the League of Nations matches in Azerbaijan and Kazakhstan, where Samuel Slovák led the national team after the end of Štefan Tarkovič. “We started to develop this idea and on June 28 we met with Mr. Calzon, where we said that we could imagine a collaboration. At the first meeting, we agreed to work together. Mr. Calzona already worked for the Slovak Football Association during July,” continued Kováčik. They weren’t waiting for Weiss, but for lawyers In recent weeks, it was speculated that the association was waiting for the announcement of a new coach and was monitoring the situation surrounding Vladimír Weiss senior. in Slovan Bratislava. He admitted that if he had not led the Slovak champion to the group of the Conference League, he might have ended up on the bench. Kováčik explained that the delay was caused by the resolution of legal and tax issues regarding the contract with the Italian coach: “The structure of his contract is much more demanding than that of domestic coaches or coaches from the Czech Republic. Since Mr. Calzona will not be domiciled in Slovakia, it was very important to prepare the contract so that we know exactly which funds he will tax in Slovakia and which in Italy. So that we all feel comfortable in this regard and never have any fundamental problem in the future.” Also read Šesták: Calzona? Tarkovič was also a great expert. So that it’s not a big deal… According to Kováčik, it was the first time that someone outside the SFZ executive committee proposed a new coach: “I’m very glad that it was Marek Hamšík who spoke up. I have called many times that if anyone has a good idea from outside the structure, let them come up with it and we will certainly deal with it. I’m glad we made it this far. Although I realize that the most important thing in football and especially with the A-team are the results.” They also want to use him for the education of Calzono. In addition to Sarri, he worked with Luciano Spalletti and Eusebio Di Francesco. Like the hockey association with Craig Ramsay, the football association wants to use a foreign expert to train local coaches. “We want to use his potential, skills and experience from working with top experts in Italian football. The latter is one of the most important in Europe in terms of tactical schemes and the organization of the defensive or offensive part. We agreed that we will use his experience for the coaches of youth national teams from U21 to U15. We will try to organize meetings so that the transfer of information is as smooth as possible and we use its potential,” said Belaník. Also Read A King’s Salary? How much does Calzona earn compared to Weiss, Kozak or…