managers are not from the country whose team they manage?
I'd be happy to be more lenient on the rules and allow potential managers to have a couple of countries of interest if they were long-time residents, or played a lot of football there, etc... But the straight up mercenary nature of it just feels a bit off.
that seems to take place on the regular with dual-citizenship players.
but maybe I'm used to it.
Basketball teams, Rugby teams. There are track athletes that work with coaches that don't share their nationality. Gymnasts. Tennis players. Swimmers. Skiers. There are all sorts of teams and individuals representing their country, that hire the best coach available regardless of the coaches' nationality. There are also countries with a strong pipelines that develop coaches and those coaches take jobs in other countries.
I saw Bora and the Denim Stars take on Brazil at Stanford Stadium in 1994. They were fearless.
One of the best sports days in my life, even with a loss.
1. Perhaps the PL is a bad example, but about half the managers are from the UK (and not all are from England itself). The managers of the top clubs, presumably the best managers, are mostly from foreign countries. Does the home-grown manager give the best chance of success.
2. Managers from within the country may have or perceived to have their own favorites from their own team and may have a bad history with players. An outsider may have a cleaner path to selecting the team.
3. For less-accomplished nations (e.g. the USA) the level of play in hte national leagues may be inferior, and a home-grown manager may not realize how his choices stack up against true world-class players.
4. The MLS-syndrome is probably not unique to the USA. An outsider has his own best interests at stake and is not burdened by the financial desires of the home country that often work against development and/or selection of the team.
club to become Tite's coach in waiting and take over the Selecao after the next world cup. I was surprised by that given Brazil's standing in the sport and that they have to possess the depth to find someone in country. I can't imagine Brazilians would have responded favorably to that even with someone as accomplished as Xavi Hernandez.
I agree that small countries would be crippled by it but the following federations should be able to source a countrymen: England, France, Spain, Italy, Germany, Argentina, Brazil, Netherlands, and Portugal. I am sure I am also missing a few.
And countries like Estonia or Botswana aren't going to attract a football pedigree to be a long-time resident or play a lot of football there.
Mercenary it is for much of the world's National Teams, although I do agree it was odd when the Three Lions experimented with Eriksson and then Capello from 2001-2012.
Like, I don't begrudge Cyprus for having a Greek manager, nor San Marino for having an Italian. Or, even setting aside cases like that of obvious cultural and linguistic ties, Kosovo having a Swiss manager. But Hungary seems a big enough traditional footballing nation not to have to hire an Italian; Bosnia with a Bulgarian is even odder -- coming from a decidedly lesser country on the hierarchy.
excuse for England to have a manager who isn't English. of course, I say this and my own nation (Canada) has a foreign manager. I can live with that double standard if Canada qualifies for the next world cup
Look at the Prem managers.
