Rome, January 14 - Luciano Spalletti arrived in Rome Thursday and was set to take charge of his first training session later in the day in his second spell at the Giallorossi's helm after replacing Rudi Garcia. "I'm happy," the Italian said as he gave the thumbs up to journalists at Fiumicino Airport. Spalletti, 56, was in charge of Roma from 2005 to 2009. They won the the Italian Cup in 2007 and 2008 under the attack-minded tactician and he led Roma to consecutive Champions League quarter-finals, where they were knocked out both times by Manchester United. The Giallorossi also ran Inter Milan close for the 2007 and 2008 scudettos. After Roma, the former midfielder had a successful stint at Zenit Saint Petersburg, leading them to two Russian league titles, a Russian Cup and a Russian Super Cup between 2009 and 2014. Garcia was sacked Wednesday after being under fire amid poor results for some time. Roma are trailing Serie A leaders Napoli by seven points in fifth place at the season's half-way stage after Saturday's 1-1 draw with fellow strugglers AC Milan. They managed to creep into the last 16 of the Champions League under Garcia despite a 6-1 thrashing by Barcelona in the group stage, but they are out of the Italian Cup after being ousted by second-tier Spezia. Garcia, who led Lille to the French title in 2011, got off to a great start on the Roma bench in the 2013-14 season, when they pushed Juventus hard for the Serie A title. But they lost their way in the second half of last season, while still managing to finish second, and also suffered the humiliation of losing 7-1 to Bayern Munich in the Champions League.