Luciano Spalletti (born 7 March 1959 in Certaldo, Florence) is an Italian football coach who currently manages AS Roma in Serie A.
      A former football player for Serie C teams such as Empoli and Spezia, Spalletti's early career in management led him to struggling Empoli, where he lead the Tuscanian side to two consecutive promotions from Serie C1 to Serie A. However, it was at Udinese where he really began to make an impact as a manager. During the 2004-2005 season, Spalletti guided Udinese to a sensational fourth-placed finish in Serie A, exceeding expectations and securing a spot in the UEFA Champions League. Such success for a traditionally unexceptional side with limited resources attracted the attention of AS Roma. The capital side had come off a disappointing season, in which four different coaches had spells in charge of the club. Spalletti was offered the task of attempting to bring order to this chaotic side.
      After an uninspiring first half of the 2005-2006 season, he changed the team's tactics to attacking rather than defensive. On 26 February 2006, Roma broke the Serie A record for consecutive wins (11) with a 2-0 victory over SS Lazio. However, by the end of the season, Roma failed to reach 4th place, therefore failing to qualify for the UEFA Champions League. Spalletti also took Roma into the Coppa Italia final against Inter during the 2005-2006 season but lost. However, Roma qualified for the 2006-2007 UEFA Champions League, since Juventus was relegated and Fiorentina and AC Milan received point deductions, all as a result of the Serie A match-fixing scandal.
      Spalletti's favoured formation is the 4-2-3-1 system, where he uses 4 defenders, 2 defensive midfielders, 2 wingers (both sides of the 3), 1 attacking midfielder, and 1 striker. This system proved effective upon its introduction during the 2005-2006 season for A.S Roma. As a result, the team climbed the charts from 15th to 5th place by the end of the season. During that time, Roma also went on an 11-match winning streak.
      At the end of 2006, Spalletti was elected Serie A Coach of the Year and, in the following months, led Roma until the Champions League quarter-final after a 2-0 victory over Olympique Lyon at Stade Gerland in the first knockout round. In the quarter-final, despite a promising 2-1 win in the first leg, Roma crumbled incredibly to a 7-1 annihilation at the hands of Sir Alex Ferguson's Manchester United.
      The team, however, succeeded in winning against Roberto Mancini's Inter Milan 1-3 in San Siro, in a match that the nerazzurri had to win to get mathematically the 2007 Scudetto against the only rival they had in the championship.
      In the second season of Spalletti's direction, AS Roma finished runners-up in Serie A with three games to go, and won the Coppa Italia against Inter Milan, with an aggregate result of 7-4, 6-2 in the first leg in Rome and 2-1 in Milan. It was the first important trophy in Spalletti's career, who only had won a Coppa Italia di Serie C with Empoli.