In his latest book, Carlo Ancelotti tells the story of how Roman Abramovich told him before Chelsea played Manchester United in the quarter-finals of the Champions League in 2011, that if his side lost he should not “bother coming back to work”. “We lost and I did go back to work, though I felt like a dead man walking,” Ancelotti recounts. “I suppose I could have confronted the owner but it seemed pointless.”

As Ancelotti, the great three-times winner of the Champions League as a manager, twice more as a player, holds court in the offices of his publishers overlooking the Thames on Tuesday, those 12 months having unreasonable demands made of him at Chelsea feel a long time ago. He has won the Champions League, with Real Madrid in 2014, since then, and at the end of next month he will take over at Bayern Munich, the eighth club in a glittering coaching CV.