‘I would like to stay’: Ancelotti wants to continue as Brazil coach after 2026 FIFA World Cup and reveals it could be his last job

Carlo Ancelotti arrived in Brazil with five Champions League titles as a manager, league trophies from Europe’s five major leagues and a reputation for making the elite dressing rooms a little easier.

A year later, he knows this job is something different: less club grind, more national obsession and perhaps his last performance.

For now, the Italian is enjoying the rhythm of national team football and said an extension of his contract until 2030 was close.

Ancelotti signed a one-year contract when he took over as Brazil manager last May, but will stay on after the World Cup.

«I think so, it’s all settled, we just have to sign it. I’d like to stay,» he said.

«I see a team with great potential for the future. We have top-class young players, a new generation coming through here, who are of a very high level.»

DIFFERENT KIND OF TEST

The 66-year-old Italian took charge of Brazil after a glittering club career, but preparation for the World Cup has brought a different kind of test: fewer training sessions, more emotion and the pain of choosing 26 names in a country where the iconic yellow jersey represents more than just a team.

Brazil will be without key players including Rodrygo, ‌Estevao ⁠ and Eder Militao through injury, adding another layer of psychological tension before Ancelotti announces his squad in Rio de Janeiro on Monday. And there’s also Neymar, whose inclusion (or not) in the squad has the country holding its breath.

READ ALSO | Brazil provisional squad for 2026 FIFA World Cup

Brazil, which together with holders Argentina is the fourth favorite to win the World Cup behind European champions Spain, France and England, will face Morocco, Haiti and Scotland in Group C.

“It weighs heavily on me,” Ancelotti said Reuters in an exclusive interview on Tuesday when asked about the human cost of cutting players from his squad.

«I have to make a professional judgment about a player, a person who I personally get on very well with, players who have been with us but who I may not be able to call up; ultimately this has an impact. It affects my emotions,» he said.

“It is a relief to present the selection list. Although more than the relief you feel because you have done your job, it is something that is colored by the sadness you feel when you have to make this decision.”

Relief is a word Ancelotti often returns to. Winning, he said, doesn’t bring pure joy so much as it relieves the pressure before the next demand comes.

“When you win, you don’t feel happiness, you feel relief,” he said. “And when you lose, it’s real physical and mental suffering.”

That understanding of suffering could be useful in Brazil, where recent World Cup failures are being treated like national autopsies. It has now been 24 years since they last won the title.

READ ALSO | Ancelotti says Brazil must turn World Cup pressure into motivation to end 24-year wait

Ancelotti said he wants to create an atmosphere in the squad that is calm, humble and serious enough to bear the pressure rather than be crushed by it.

CHANGE OF RHYTHM

The move from club football to a national team has also changed the rhythm of Ancelotti’s life.

In his last club job at Real Madrid, the next match always took a few days. With Brazil there is more time to think – and perhaps more time for a manager who has spent 30 years adapting to the changing face of football.

“It’s a different job,” Ancelotti said. «This job gives me more time to think, more peace of mind… Back to a club? I don’t think so. It could well be my last job.»

The Italian’s connection with Brazil goes back to his playing days at AS Roma in the early 1980s, when he played alongside icons such as Falcao and Toninho Cerezo.

There was also the 1994 World Cup, when he was assistant to Arrigo Sacchi as Italy lost the final to Brazil on penalties.

Ancelotti said he could not have foreseen at the time that he would one day coach Brazil – or that Italy would be absent from another World Cup.

«I couldn’t have imagined a month or two ago that Italy would pull out of the World Cup and unfortunately this is now the third consecutive World Cup that Italy has missed,» he said.

READ ALSO | The failed World Cup qualification and the fall of Italy are no longer a surprise

The Italians lost in a penalty shootout to Bosnia and Herzegovina in their play-off final in March.

“For an Italian this is sad, but it is an opportunity for Italians to support Brazil in this World Cup,” Ancelotti said.

ANCELOTTI PLAYS MANY ROLES

The Italian said his greatest continuity as a coach was not tactical, but human. He has changed with the game, helped by younger staff, but his relationship with players remains much the same as when he started coaching in 1995.

“I feel like the manager, the friend, the teammate, many things; ‌the father sometimes too, why not?” he said.

Then came the Ancelotti twinkle. He remembered a Brazilian player – unnamed – who once told him he was getting married in a week, but didn’t want to go through with it.

“I said to him: ‘Look, you have to make the decision that your heart tells you,’” Ancelotti said with a laugh.

The player is not married.

“So there are many aspects to my job: coach, father… sometimes even therapist,” Ancelotti said with a smile. “I enjoy it, I really do.”

Published on May 14, 2026