The Italian national team have offered Carlo Ancelotti the chance to take over as manager, according to reports in the country.

Sky Sports reported that the team made Ancelotti the offer to take over on Tuesday morning. It’s an apparent blow to Arsenal’s chances of bringing the 58-year-old in to replace the departing Arsene Wenger.

The media have often listed Ancelotti as one of the managers on Arsenal’s shortlist. Ivan Gazidis even reportedly met with the Italian earlier this season. Now it seems the club have competition.

On the other hand, quotes from the manager himself in the past suggest he has no interest in the Italy job. In December he told RAI: “I would like to continue to train a club team. The national team? It would be like changing jobs.

“Italian football has problems and I do not think I can solve them on my own. It’s a federation problem. The FIGC [Federazione Italiana Giuoco Calcio] contacted me and I told them the same thing.”

If all the Italians have done is offered Ancelotti the same job again, I don’t know why he’d accept. From the sounds of things, he wants them to make big changes before he’d even consider it.

Plus, he’s right that managing a national team is a completely different prospect to a club side. For some managers that’s half the appeal, for Ancelotti it seems more like a drawback.

I don’t know what’s going on behind the scenes, so maybe they have made a convincing case for Ancelotti to change his mind. Until I see some evidence of that though, it seems more likely Sky are just taking advantage of the speculation around Arsenal at the moment.