Not many football managers have a tattoo of Che Guevara, dance in their free time and speak five languages.
But they are just three quirks which add to the layers of intrigue around Burnley’s new boss Fabio Celestini, an unknown Swiss tasked with saving the Clarets from double relegation and dropping into the third tier for the first time since 2000.
After four wins in the last year, with morale in the gutter, Burnley announced Celestini as Nicky Hayen’s successor on Wednesday. Many fans will have dropped their marmalade. Who? Celestini’s CV is promising but this is an almighty gamble and they cannot afford for things to go wrong.
The Clarets sit 22nd in the Championship and have won just one home game inside 90 minutes in 2026. Their summer was an unmitigated disaster – they had woeful pre-season results, went 71 days without a manager, sold last campaign’s top scorer Zian Flemming on deadline day with no replacement, and their chief executive, James Holroyd, walked out in September after difficulties working alongside chairman Alan Pace.
The club is in £142million of debt, according to their latest accounts, with £13m in cash in the coffers. The phrase ‘basket case’ comes to mind.
Celestini’s appointment falls squarely on the shoulders of new chief football officer Diego Lopez, another stranger to English football, and it is one Burnley’s players are unsure about.
Fabio Celestini is facing an uphill battle to avoid relegation with Burnley, who sit 22nd in the Championship
Belgian boss Nicky Hayen lasted just 12 league matches – and won only once
Burnley have not been in the third tier since 2000 but are staring down the barrel of a second successive relegation
Daily Mail Sport understands that some members of the squad have reservations about Celestini’s style of play – he has favoured a possession-based 4-2-3-1 throughout his career, a system which Hayen tried and failed to implement during his time in charge.
Many clubs have turned to outsiders and succeeded – just look at table-toppers Middlesbrough under Kim Hellberg – but the lack of Championship experience in Burnley’s management structure leaves Celestini to navigate a steep learning curve without much support.
On the bright side, Celestini inherited a similarly shambolic case at Basel in October 2023 and thrived. The Swiss giants were bottom of the table and had had to cancel their goal of the month award, because they hadn’t scored any. Celestini saved them from relegation, restored the feel-good factor by re-signing club legend Xherdan Shaqiri, and won them the league and cup double the following season.
The 50-year-old former Switzerland midfielder – who won 35 caps for his country and played against England’s Golden Generation at Euro 2004 – also has a promotion on his ledger from his time at Lausanne and a Swiss Cup with Luzern. He also led Lugano into Europe and managed Sion.
‘Celestini is a determined, ambitious personality, but he can also be a stubborn coach and that has caused issues at several clubs,’ Swiss football expert Craig King (@FootballSwissEN on X) tells Daily Mail Sport.
‘He is capable of providing clubs with a short-term bounce before it eventually deteriorates. He has strong ideas, but his stubbornness often tends to rub people the wrong way.
‘It seems that inevitably, he loses control of his teams somewhere along the way and can never get them back on track.’
His time at Russian giants CSKA Moscow, last season after he left Basel, followed that trend. He had found out about their interest on a holiday with his dancer wife, Fanny, in the Seychelles, and took the plunge, rocking up with a Spanish-speaking coaching coterie. He even appointed his wife to help edit video clips for analysis and support in aspects of communication, a club source tells Daily Mail Sport.
He enjoyed a strong start at CSKA – he won the Russian Super Cup in his first match and they led the Russian Premier League after 11 games. Going into the winter break, they were just four points off top in fourth.
‘Fabio has done a tremendous job,’ the club’s general director Roman Babaev said during that hiatus. ‘There was beautiful football.’
By the end of Celestini’s tenure in May, Babaev was describing a ‘lack of self-confidence and a lack of belief in their ability to turn the situation around’. He added: ‘We agreed that things could only get worse – the head coach doubted the team was listening to him.’
Celestini won 35 caps for Switzerland and appeared against England at Euro 2004
Burnley are Celestini’s eighth club as a manager, having left CSKA Moscow by mutual consent in May
What changed? Reports in Russia claimed that over the winter break, players had been unimpressed with the lack of physical and defensive work, with too much emphasis on attacking and set-pieces. They lost their first three games back after the break, suffered a humbling 4-0 thrashing by Krasnodar in the Russian Cup, and went winless in Celestini’s final five matches in charge.
In the space of two months, everything had unravelled. After defender Moises was sent off in the drubbing at Krasnodar, Celestini reprimanded the player in the dressing room – but the Brazilian hit back, questioning his manager’s competence in front of the team. Moises was subsequently suspended and the club took Celestini’s side.
‘I felt like something was missing, I wasn’t feeling well, something wasn’t right. Other players started saying they weren’t feeling well,’ Moises later reflected in the documentary We Are CSKA. ‘To become a champion, you need to cleanse yourself of all dirt. I blurted it all out because I knew what was simmering inside us all.’
Celestini is still well thought of at CSKA and was always willing to take accountability rather than criticise his players publicly. Former manager Viktor Goncharenko claimed that he ultimately failed because he ‘didn’t find common ground with the CSKA veterans’, such as legendary goalkeeper Igor Akinfeev, and didn’t have enough Russian coaches. He left with the club sixth in the table.
Celestini’s task now is to turn around a flailing Burnley. His first assignment will be on Saturday at Turf Moor against in-form Portsmouth. Based off how he describes himself, he does not come across as a disciplinarian. Celestini says he does not like implementing fines and is not a fan of throwing things across a dressing room.
‘This kind of half-time behavior might only work once a season,’ he once said. ‘It’s like an electric shock.’
At his heart Celestini appears to be an idealist. Earlier in his career he established a foundation to support players from underprivileged backgrounds and he set up a football school in Havana.
His tattoo of Cuban revolutionary Guevara cost 180 Swiss francs (£163). He has lost count of his tattoos by now, also inking his kids and a depiction of good triumphing over evil.
Celestini appears to be an idealist. Earlier in his career he established a foundation to support players from underprivileged backgrounds and he set up a football school in Havana
Daily Mail Sport understands some Burnley players have reservations about Celestini’s possession-based 4-2-3-1, a system which Hayen failed to implement
‘I started reading about (Guevara), studying him. My tattoo depicts him without his military beret. There are no political references,’ he said. ‘What attracts me to him is that he fought his whole life for those who had nothing to do with him, and I’ve also fought a lot in my life, so I decided to get it.’
Another of his heroes is Nelson Mandela: ‘He also dedicated his entire life to his ideas. Anyone who fought for their ideals is important to me. I admire people who take the time to help others. I don’t consider myself a good person, but I’m not a hypocrite.’
Away from football, Celestini – who speaks Italian, French, Spanish, German and English – also dances with his wife and enjoys boxing. A former electrical draughtsman, he has a good work ethic and, we hear, made a strong push for the Burnley job.
A source at the Clarets, who were also interested in Rob Edwards and Carlos Corberan, insists that Celestini was their first choice. Now they are counting on him to deliver a minor miracle.
