Elena Sadiku’s modesty very briefly breaks. “I was pretty good,” she says. “I am not going to lie.” The point is perfectly contextual rather than needlessly arrogant. Sadiku’s extraordinary – and extraordinarily complex – relationship with football will reach its latest peak on Tuesday, when her Celtic team host Twente in the Women’s Champions League.
Sadiku, who will not turn 31 until November, will break the record set by Julian Nagelsmann as the youngest coach in the male or female version of European football’s premier club competition.
How Sadiku has cause to cherish this moment. Her earlier reference point is to her time as a player, which was cut short in 2018 after 13 surgeries. At one gruesome stage, aged only 23, she faced the prospect of amputation of her left leg after a knee operation led to a serious infection.
“I put my whole life in to become a professional player and I wanted it so badly,” the Celtic coach says. “When that dream gets taken away from you, it makes you question life. I always thought that I would quit, that I would have control.
“At that time when I knew that I had to stop, I didn’t want work in football because I felt everything was just not fair. But after that, I just felt like football is something that I didn’t want to live without. Football is my biggest passion. Football has brought me and has formed me to the person I am today.
“I didn’t live through my full potential as a player. I want to make sure that I can help my players to fulfil their dreams and their potential. I’ve just lived by the mindset of trying to be the best coach I can be, to make my players the best they can be. I chose to think: ‘OK, it happened for a reason. I have something better in front of me and then just start over again.’ Which I did.”
The clarity and conviction with which the former Swedish youth international speaks renders it obvious why she appealed to Celtic. Her low points, which led to depression at one stage, have shaped her, but admirably Sadiku is not at all bitter. Her passion for the job at hand is immediately plain. What came before just feels wholly relevant.
“I did my first ACL [anterior cruciate ligament] when I was 19,” she says. “I came back, I scored a hat-trick, life was amazing. Three months after, I did it again on the same knee. I was away for 18 months because I had a massive surgery, not only ACL, I had a leg reconstruction. It was a six-hour surgery, I was in a wheelchair for two months.
“My mentality is to keep working, try, fight, don’t give up. I did it again, the third time and then when I went into that infection period which made me question everything. I was scared of losing my life.
“When the doctors talked about amputating my leg, I remember waking up from that surgery and just like freaking: ‘Is my leg still here?’ The infection went down and I could leave hospital but I was questioning a lot. I had this identity crisis, I didn’t know what I wanted to do. When something that you love so much gets taken away from you … it’s not something I ever thought would happen.”
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Playing’s loss has been coaching’s gain. Sadiku studied for her badges while working in China, Denmark and Sweden. She was in charge of Everton’s under-21 side before moving north. Celtic earned a Champions League group-stage berth – the first Scottish team to do so – after a qualifying win over Vorskla Poltava.
Sadiku has no plans simply to admire the surroundings, with Chelsea and Real Madrid lying in wait beyond Twente. “I don’t really let things sink in because I’m just focused on every game that we have ahead of us, so I’m not really enjoying it or thinking: ‘Wow, what have I achieved?’ But it makes me proud because I’ve had a tough time and all the work has eventually brought me to this location.
“It’s not going to change. I’m going to make sure that the players are the best prepared and there’s a game plan that is simple to follow. We are going to go with the mentality of trying to win the game. We are still Celtic.”
Sadiku’s alliance with Celtic has already delivered marquee moments since the replaced the excitable Fran Alonso in January. A 90th-minute Amy Gallacher strike secured the Scottish Women’s Premier League title, on goal difference from Rangers, four months later. This marked Celtic’s first title. Sadiku’s team were 2-0 down to Rangers after 64 minutes on Thursday evening but recovered to secure a point. The competitive intensity attached to life in Glaswegian football appeals.
“For me, that’s what everything has been about since I was young. I always want to win,” she explains. “I always want to be the best. That pressure means that you need to try to be your best every day. I want to be the best coach I can be and I want to be as successful as I can be. To be that, I can never be comfortable.
“I want the players to be excited, hungry and we need to learn from this experience as well. We know that this experience is going to make us better in the long term.”