Cesc Fàbregas Open to Real Madrid Coaching Role

Cesc Fàbregas has spent most of his football life on the other side of the Real Madrid divide. La Masia graduate. Barcelona midfielder. Standard bearer for a generation that defined a club and a style.

Yet the Como coach is not closing the door on the Santiago Bernabéu.

Speaking to Cadena Cope after guiding Como to their first-ever European qualification, Fàbregas was asked directly about the idea of one day managing Real Madrid. He didn’t flinch. He didn’t rule it out either.

“I don’t have a red line,” he said, before drawing only one boundary of his own: “One red line, and I’ve been very clear about this from the beginning, is that I wouldn’t want to be an assistant… for example. I’m clear that I want to be a head coach.”

A Barça man, open to Madrid. But only on his terms.

Como project comes first

Fàbregas’ stock is rising fast in Serie A. Como’s surge into Europe has turned heads across the continent, with big clubs quietly tracking his progress. Among those, reports have linked both Chelsea and Real Madrid with admiration for his work.

Yet the 37-year-old made it clear he is in no rush to cash in on his growing reputation.

“I’m a shareholder in the club (Como), I saw a project to start coaching, I have a contract and I’m very relaxed… I’m in a place that helps me grow and I’m very happy. I’m the one who makes the signings.”

That line says plenty. Fàbregas is not just a touchline presence; he is embedded in Como’s structure, invested financially and emotionally. This is not a short stop on the way to the elite. It is his proving ground.

So when the subject of Real Madrid came up, he framed it almost as an abstract idea rather than a concrete ambition.

“The other thing (the possibility of Real Madrid)? I haven’t even thought about it or considered it. I haven’t had time for anything.”

He is not campaigning for the job. He is simply not shutting the door.

Admiration for Ancelotti and Luis Enrique

Asked which coaches he looks up to, Fàbregas pointed to two very different reference points.

He highlighted Luis Enrique’s work over the past two years, impressed by the Spaniard’s evolution and impact. But when it came to the one coach he would have loved to play under, he went straight to Carlo Ancelotti.

It was not tactics that he picked out. It was the Italian’s human side.

From Fàbregas, that matters. As a player, he worked under some of the most demanding minds in the game. Pep Guardiola, Arsène Wenger, José Mourinho, Luis Enrique. He has seen every angle of authority and man-management. The fact he singles out Ancelotti’s humanity underlines where he wants to stand as a coach: close to his players, but clearly in charge.

And that leads directly to how he views one of the flashpoints of Real Madrid’s recent past.

How he would handle a Vinícius storm

Real Madrid’s disastrous season has been dissected from every angle, with some pointing back to a moment in El Clásico as a turning point: Vinícius Júnior’s angry reaction when Xabi Alonso substituted him.

Fàbregas was asked how he would have handled that kind of confrontation.

“What happened with Xabi Alonso and Vinicius… it’s a moment where you have to be prepared to make a good decision, and above all, what makes you a better coach is that you have to think about the team first. Nobody is better than the team, nobody is stronger than the team, and nobody is above the team.”

That is the core of his coaching creed. The badge and the dressing room come before the star.

“If you have a united and strong group, whoever wants to mess things up can do whatever they want, you’ll have the group’s respect and you’ll always do better in the long run.”

It is a hard line delivered in calm language. Fàbregas is not interested in public theatrics. He is interested in control, in the collective, in long-term authority.

The irony is obvious. A former Barcelona midfielder, shareholder-coach at Como, openly admiring Ancelotti’s human touch and laying out how he would impose order on a Real Madrid dressing room.

If his rise continues at this pace, the question will not be whether he would consider the Bernabéu. It will be whether Madrid, or any other giant, can prise him away from the project he is quietly turning into one of Europe’s most intriguing stories.