Watford's new head coach Claudio Ranieri has brought with him three trusted accomplices to help in his new role.

Two assistants, Paolo Benetti and Carlo Cornacchia are also joined by fitness coach Carlo Spignoli.

All three have worked with Ranieri before and know the one another very well.

The first of the trio, Benetti, is actually Ranieri's brother-in-law and has worked closely with him since 2007, when the pair first worked together at Juventus.

He has since been an assistant to the Tinkerman at Roma, Inter Milan, Monaco, the Greece national team, FC Nantes, Fulham, Leicester City and Sampdoria, where he and Ranieri guided a side from the bottom of the league to ninth in the table in just under two seasons.

Also at Sampdoria was Cornacchia, who even played for Ranieri during a spell at Cagliari around 30 years ago and worked with him at Nantes, Fulham and Roma too.

Speaking on the Way of Champions podcast in May, he described his boss as "an institution" and said: "He is a perfect example of a gentleman who is there to help you out."

The coach is also a published author, having written a book titled Coaching Soccer Is Easy: Or So You Thought! that was published in 2015.

He spent 12 years coaching in Colorado, USA.

Finally, fitness coach Spignoli, who was also a member of Ranieri's backroom staff at Sampdoria.

He has previously spent time at Cagliari, A.S Livorno, Bologna and Sassuolo in Italy and was part of the backroom team at Monaco when they reached the semi final of the Champions League in 2017.

Also on the coaching team are goalkeeping coach Antonello Brambilla, performance coordinator Alvaro Reina and performance manager Jordi Garcia, all three of whom have retained their positions.