Managing Real Madrid can often seem like soccer’s impossible job.
No other club has such suffocatingly high standards set by array of glittering legends from bygone eras.
Few coaches are able to deal with the demands of delivering continued success domestically and in Europe, while also keeping demanding fans, superstar players and unpredictable presidents happy.
Some managers have—famously—won trophies and still fallen short of expectations, while others who succeeded elsewhere have failed to deal with the heat of the Bernabéu.
There are those, though, who rise to the big occasion, earning their place in history and playing pivotal roles making Real Madrid what it is today.
Here are the ten best Real Madrid managers ever.
Real Madrid Legends: Los Blancos’ Best Managers of All Time
10. Fabio Capello
Capello only spent two seasons at Real Madrid, ten years apart, but few boast a better league record.
With a front three of Raúl, Davor Šuker and Pedrag Mijatović, Madrid finished on 92 points in the 1996–97 campaign, edging out Barcelona, while the Italian manager set the template for the following season’s European glory.
Upon returning in 2006, Capello delivered Madrid their 30th league title—their first domestic crown for four years after the malaise of the latter stages of the Galácticos era.
9. Leo Beenhakker
Once described by Zlatan Ibrahimovic as a harder version of Doc Brown from “Back to the Future”, “Don Leo” had two spells as Real Madrid manager, winning three consecutive La Liga titles between 1987–1989.
The Dutchman is closely associated with the Quinta del Buitre (Vulture Squad) with Emilio Butragueño in attack.
Despite domestic trophies, he was unable to bring European success back to Madrid.
8. Luis Carniglia
A former forward from Argentina, Carniglia was famous for making new signing Ferenc Puskás shed 15kg (33 pounds) upon joining Madrid after a year out of the game.
In his two seasons at Real Madrid between 1957–1959, Carniglia’s star-packed team—featuring Alfredo Di Stefano, Paco Gento and Puskás—won La Liga once and the European Cup twice.
He was sacked by president Santiago Bernabéu shortly after beating Reims 2–0 in the 1959 final.
7. José Mourinho
The lows were low, but the highs were very high under Mourinho.
Before all the bitterness, the “Special One” delivered Madrid their best-ever La Liga finish, topping the table with 100 points in 2011–12, while plundering an astonishing 112 goals in the process.
Mourinho might have been the only manager capable of going toe to toe with Pep Guardiola’s Barcelona during their peak years, and the two clubs’s rivalry made El Clásico box-office viewing.
However, three consecutive Champions League semi-final exits were ultimately a failure.
6. José Villalonga
An architect of Madrid’s first golden age, Villalonga won everything on offer during a three-year spell in the ‘50s.
Only ever an amateur as a player, Villalonga found enormous success as a coach at the highest level, helping steer Di Stefano and Co. to the first-ever European Cup title in 1956.
He defended the crown a year later, completing a treble that season alongside La Liga and the now-defunct Latin Cup.
5. Luis Molowny
A stalwart of Madrid’s midfield throughout the ‘40s and ‘50s, Molowny managed the club on four separate occasions between 1974 and 1986—becoming Los Blancos’s go-to option whenever they were in a spot.
Molowny was more than a firefighter however, and won three La Liga titles, two Copas del Rey, one Copa de la Liga and, most notably, the club’s first-ever UEFA Cups in 1985 and 1986.
4. Vicente Del Bosque
Before becoming a manager, Del Bosque was a formidable midfield presence, who rose up from the youth academy to win five league titles and four Copas del Rey for Madrid as a player.
As a coach, he is remembered as one of the all-time greats for both club and country and one of only two managers in history to win both the Champions League and World Cup.
At Madrid, Del Bosque lifted two Champions Leagues and two La Liga titles in four years. Florentino Pérez’s move to replace him with Carlos Queiroz in 2003—in order to “shake up the team”—ranks as one of the worst decisions in the club’s history.
3. Zinedine Zidane
It is hard to overstate the impact Zidane has had on the modern Madrid.
As a player, he brought a never-before-seen grace to Los Blancos’ midfield and scored one of the all-time great Champions League final goals with his volley against Leverkusen in 2002.
As a manager, he went even better, leading the club to the European three-peat—a feat that has not been done before or since in the Champions League age.
The former Ballon d’Or winner, who lifted 11 titles as coach, had a knack for getting the best out of his star names while tapping into Madrid’s affinity for big European nights.
2. Miguel Muñoz
The club’s longest-serving manager can also claim to be one of their most successful. Certainly at domestic level, no other Real Madrid manager comes close to Muñoz when it comes to trophies.
The former Los Blancos’s captain earned nine La Liga titles as coach between 1959–1974—including a streak of a five in a row.
Muñoz was also dominant on the continent, guiding Madrid to the 1960 European Cup, before repeating the feat six years later after helping the team transition into a new era post-Di Stefano.
1. Carlo Ancelotti
The manager with the most trophies in the club’s history (15), Ancelotti embodied the ideal leader for Real Madrid.
Calm, cultured and tactically astute, Ancelotti’s most famous talent as Madrid boss was as a horse whisperer to talented stars with big egos.
The Italian led the club to La Décima in 2014, taking the club to the pinnacle of soccer once again after an unacceptably barren 12 years in Europe.
He then returned to win the Champions League twice more in 2022 and 2024, cementing both his and Real Madrid’s image as an unstoppable force in Europe despite the opponent, form, or even logic.
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This article was originally published on www.si.com as The 10 Best Real Madrid Managers of All Time—Ranked.
