In his first press conference as the newly appointed head coach of England, Thomas Tuchel – a German – was asked on Wednesday (October 16, 2024) what message he would give to fans who prefer an Englishman in charge of their beloved national team.
“I’m sorry, I only have a German passport,” he said, laughing, and then professed his love for English football and the country. “I will do everything to honor this role and this country.”
The football rivalry between England and Germany runs deep and it is likely that Tuchel’s passport will be used against him if he does not deliver results for a country that has not lifted the men’s trophy since 1966. But the appointment of England’s third foreign coach shows that, increasingly, even the country top in sports abandoning the long-held belief that the national team should be led by one of their own.
Four of the top nine teams in the FIFA world rankings currently have foreign coaches. Even in Germany, the four-time World Cup champion who has never had a foreign coach, candidates such as Dutch Louis van Gaal and Austrian Oliver Glasner were considered serious contenders for the top job before the country’s football federation last year appointed Julian Nagelsmann, who is German.
“The coaching method is universal and exists for everyone,” said the German football researcher and author Christoph Wagner, whose latest book. Crossing the line? historically addresses the Anglo-German rivalry. “It’s more personality that counts not nationality. You can be a good coach, and work with a group of players who aren’t perceptive enough to get your method.
Not everyone agrees.
English football writer and journalist Jonathan Wilson said it was an “admission of failure” for major football nations to have coaches from other countries.
“Personally, I have to be the best in one country rather than the best in another country, and that probably applies to coaches as well as players,” said Wilson, whose book is included. Inverting The Pyramid: A History of Soccer Tactics.
“To say that we can’t find anyone in our country who is good enough to coach our players,” he said, “I think there’s something a little bit shameful, a little bit unpleasant about that.”
The sentiment was echoed by British tabloids The Daily Mailwho reported on Tuchel’s appointment with the provocative title “A Dark Day for England.”
No World Cup has been won by a foreign coach
While foreign coaches are often found in smaller countries and further down the world rankings, they are still rare among the game’s traditional powers. Italy, the other four-time world champion, had only Italians in charge. All Spanish coaches in modern history have been Spanish nationals. Five-time World Cup winners Brazil have only had a Brazilian in charge since 1965, and two-time world champions France have had only a Frenchman since 1975.
And it remains the case that every team that has won the World Cup, since the first tournament in 1930, has been coached by a native of that country. The situation is similar to the women’s World Cup, which has never been won by a team with a foreign coach, although Jill Ellis, who led the USA to two trophies, is a British-born US citizen.
Some coaches have made a career out of jumping from one national team to the next. Lars LagerbÀck, 76, coached his native Sweden between 2000-09 and later led the national teams of Nigeria, Iceland and Norway.
“I can’t say I feel any difference,” LagerbĂ€ck said The Associated Press. “I think it’s my team and the people’s team.”
For LagerbÀck, the obvious disadvantages of coaching a foreign country are the language difficulties and having to adapt to a new culture, which he felt during his short stint with Nigeria in 2010 when he led the African nation in the World Cup.
Otherwise, he said, “it depends on the result” – and LagerbĂ€ck is remembered fondly in Iceland, especially, after leading the country to Euro 2016 for its first international tournament, where they beat England in the round of 16.
LagerbĂ€ck pointed to his strong education and the many coaches available in football powerhouses like Spain and Italy to explain why he didn’t have to look for a coach abroad. In this year’s European Championship, five coaches were from Italy and the winning coach was Luis de la Fuente, who was promoted to the Spanish senior team after leading the youth team.
Portugal for the first time looked outside its own borders or Brazil, with which it has a historical relationship, when the Spaniard Roberto Martinez was appointed as the coach of the national team last year. Also last year, Brazil tried – and ultimately failed – to court the Italian coach of Real Madrid Carlo Ancelotti, with the president of the Brazilian football federation Ednaldo Rodrigues saying: “It doesn’t matter if it’s foreign or Brazilian, there is no prejudice about nationality.”
The United States has a long list of foreign coaches before Mauricio Pochettino, the Argentine former Chelsea manager who became the men’s head coach this year.
The English Football Association would have been reluctant to make Tuchel the third foreign-born coach of the national team, after Sweden’s Sven-Goran Eriksson (2001-06) and Italy’s Fabio Capello (2008-12), only believing that he was the best coach in that club. market.
Unlike Eriksson and Capello, Tuchel at least has experience working in English football – he won the Champions League in 18 months with Chelsea – and he also speaks better English.
That won’t satisfy all the nay-sayers, though.
“I hope I can convince them and show them and prove that I am proud to be England manager,” Tuchel said.
Published – 17 October 2024 12:04 IST
