The World Cup of Coaches

Only 23 nations are going to the World Cup and the host nation won’t even be there. Sounds crazy? This is the world cup when one looks only at the nations of the coaches of the 32 squads. The countries with more coaches? Germany and Argentina, each one has 3. And all the coaches from the latter is heading a South American nation (Argentina, Chile and Paraguay). Two nations that did not qualify for the world cup will have at least have somebody to support as they will have a coach participating in the competition. They are Honduras’ Reinaldo Rueda (from Colombia) and Côte d’Ivoire’s Vahid Halilhodzic (from Bosnia). That, then, makes only 21 the number of nations with a squad and a coach in the cup.

Nice to see that a lot of the weaker/non traditional sides has a local coach (Japan, the 2 Koreas, New Zealand, Slovenia, Slovakia), but sad to see that only 2 African coaches (from Algeria and Nigeria) will take part in the competition in their continent. Even the host nation has a foreign coach. 11 coaches in total are foreign to the squad they work for.

Number of countries in the world (having coaches as the reference):
23 countries

Amount of coaches each country has:
3 – Argentina, Germany,
2 – Brazil, Netherlands, Serbia, France, Italy
1 – USA, Mexico, Colombia, Uruguay, Slovenia, Slovakia, Bosnia, Nigeria, Algeria, South Korea, North Korea, Japan, Spain, Portugal, Denmark, New Zeland

Countries and their coaches:

NORTH AMERICA:
USA – Bob Bradley – USA
Mexico – Javier Aguirre – Mexico
Honduras – Reinaldo Rueda – Colombia

SOUTH AMERICA
Brazil – Dunga – Brazil
Paraguay – Gerardo Martino – Argentina
Chile – Marcelo Bielsa – Argentina
Argentina – Maradona – Argentina
Uruguay – Óscar Wáshington Tabárez Silva – Uruguay

AFRICA
Côte d’Ivoire – Vahid Halilhodzic – Bosnia
Ghana – Milovan Rajevac – Serbia
South Africa – Carlos Alberto Parreira – Brazil
Cameroon – Paul Le Guen – France
Nigeria – Shaibu Amodu – Nigeria
Algeria – Rabah Saadane – Algeria

EUROPE
England – Fabio Capello – Italy
Netherlands – Bert Van Marwijk – Netherlands
Spain – Vicente Del Bosque – Spain
Denmark – Morten Olsen – Denmark
Germany – Joachim Loew – Germany
Switzerland – Ottmar Hitzfeld – Germany
Italy – Marcello Lippi – Italy
Serbia Radomir Antic – Serbia
Slovakia – Vladimir Weiss – Slovakia
France – Raymond Domenech – France
Slovenia – Matjaž Kek – Slovenia
Portugal – Carlos Queiróz – Portugal
Greece – Otto Rehhagel – Germany

ASIA
Japan – Takeshi Okada – Japan
Australia – Pim Verbeek – Netherlands
North Korea – Kim Jong Hun – North Korea
South Korea – Huh Jung Moo – South Korea

OCEANIA

New Zealand -Ricki Herbert – New Zealand

Related posts:

1. World Cup Groups Are In
2. 19 Nations in South Africa; 28 Fight for 13 Spots
3. Cameroon and Nigeria going to South Africa.
4. World Cup Qualifiers: Portugal still alive. Argentina qualifies.
5. 6 more qualify: 2010 World Cup in South Africa is complete.