Cesc Fabregas has his heart set on the dugout after studying the best

Unlike most people, Cesc Fabregas did not come to the lakes of northern Italy to unwind. If anything, he’s just getting started.

The 35-year-old took the football world by storm this summer as he packed up his Premier League, LaLiga and World Cup winners’ medals and headed for Serie B and the unknown Como. There is, however, a method in the apparent madness.

Fabregas is looking forward to the next step in his career and embarking on that well-trodden path from player to coach. In the second level of Italy, he feels he has found the perfect learning environment.

He is joined by a club openly looking to expand its global reach, and by a CEO in Dennis Wise who is only too happy to help a fellow Chelsea icon on his journey. Both help the Spaniard complete his UEFA coaching badges.

He is also helped by his notebooks. Thinking a move to the dugout might one day be interesting, Fabregas began taking notes of all the managers he’d had the privilege of working with over the years.

These pages feature posts relating to some of the greatest managers of this century, with lessons from Pep Guardiola, Antonio Conte, Jose Mourinho and Arsene Wenger.

As a player, it was his former Arsenal master who appealed to him most.

‘I always talk in my team’, he says Sports post. “I’ve always spoken out, given my opinion, I’ve had conversations with players, with coaches, always in a constructive way. Give your honest opinion.

‘Arsène was always very open with communication, very open for dialogue – ‘What do you think of this?’ – asking questions. He was always testing you mentally.

“Today the coaches are not like that. They are more, “It’s me, you do what I say and that’s it”.

‘You have nothing to say. It’s a way for them to protect themselves, for them not to have to explain to anyone. They make their decisions. Who likes it, likes it, if not, you’re gone.

‘That’s the way it is with modern managers. I grew up in a different environment, with Arsene with [Vicente] Del Bosque. So was I and so will I be. Always with respect, but as I think.’

However, as Fabregas can attest, football evolves just like everything else. The locker room and training area are no longer the only educational arenas for beginning coaches.

He just rattled through the Amazon Prime documentary series Everything or nothing focusing on his old club, which gave him the opportunity to study another head coach.

Mikel Arteta’s methods are exposed in the show and Fabregas believes he shows all the characteristics of some of his most celebrated contemporaries. Arsenal’s current form in the Premier League – they top the Premier League during the international break – could indicate that the Como midfielder is a smart move.

“Sometimes the first thing we do is kill the manager,” he says. ‘The coach is always the one who pays for everything.

‘In this kind of series you really see the work a manager does, the number of hours he puts into it, the messages he sends and then you judge for yourself.

“I think Mikel comes across very well. Today, modern managers are like him. Guardiola is the same, Luis Enrique is the same, Conte, Mourinho.

“You can be more attacking, you can be more defensive – all these successful coaches are the same. The right message is that they want to win every game somehow.

“The ones you like more than the football they play, like [Jurgen] Klopp and Guardiola. But they all have the same attitude to the game, which convinces their players that it is the right way to win football matches and win trophies.”

While Fabregas is delighted at the chance to see his former club, there is a relief that he has never seen himself under the microscope on the other side of the screen.

Given his ambition to advance in the game, he accepts the direction of football coverage, admitting that there are plenty of moments in his own career – from ‘Pizza gate’ to heated exchanges with Antonio Conte at Chelsea – that he glad has escaped the attention of the cameras.

“I understand now, with social media, Amazon, Netflix is ​​what sells now,” he says. “I like looking at it, I’m not sure how I’d feel to be a part of it!”

“I’ve had moments in my career where I wouldn’t like to see myself in the dressing room.

“At Arsenal I was captain there, at Chelsea, meetings with Conte, I don’t think I would want to watch that. Meeting with Marina [Granovskaia] when I told her I was leaving the club. There are some.

“Ultimately, you have to have personality to speak out and say your thing, but always in a respectful way.”

For now, he avoids the lenses, hidden in the hills of Lake Como amid the darkness of Serie B.

He made his debut against Brescia at the end of August, in front of a modest crowd of 4,754 people, including Thierry Henry.

Like the Frenchman, Fabregas’ move to the lakes of northern Italy has also seen him invest in Como 1907, working with his longtime Arsenal mentor off the pitch.

It gives the pair a voice when it comes to business with the club, the latter of which has installed former Torino boss Moreno Longo as head coach.

It also gives the rest of the squad another world-famous star to look up to, something that should not be underestimated according to Fabregas.

“Thierry was very special as a teammate. I can only praise him so much,” says Fabregas – who recorded his first assist last weekend in Como’s 3-3 draw against SPAL. ‘I was only 16 when I joined the first team’ [at Arsenal]. They welcomed me with open arms and I love Thierry. He is someone I look up to.

“It’s important for the club. Once I got here I knew they wanted to do something special. They wanted to bring some important guys to the club, to really grow it.

“It’s a statement from the club that we want to do well. We want this club to grow, come forward as quickly as possible, and someone of Thierry’s stature will be very important.

“The players are already talking about it, they are enthusiastic. You know when you have someone on board like Thierry. You always subconsciously feel the pressure – the right pressure. You want to give even more.’

With his sights set on a life on the sidelines, it’s clear there’s still plenty to offer for Fabregas.