Scolari or Rehhagel set to make history

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Friday, July 2, 2004


Scolari or Rehhagel set to make history


LISBON, July 3 (Reuters) - No team coached by a foreigner has won either of the biggest prizes in international soccer - the European Championship and the World Cup - until now.
Portugal's Luiz Felipe Scolari or Greece coach Otto Rehhagel will make history at Sunday's Euro 2004 final.


Brazilian Scolari took his native country to the World Cup title two years ago. If Portugal win, Scolari will become only the second coach after West Germany's Helmut Schoen to win the World Cup and European title.

Otto Rehhagel, who won three league titles in his native Germany, has made nonsense of pre-tournament expectations - Greece were 80-1 to win this tournament.

At 65, he is the oldest coach to appear in a European final.

Sven-Goran Eriksson was the third foreign coach at Euro 2004 and he could not match the achievement of Englishman George Raynor who took Eriksson's native country Sweden to the 1958 World Cup final.

Though his team lost to Brazil, Raynor remains the most successful foreign coach at international team level along with Ernst Happel.

The Austrian guided the Netherlands to the 1978 World Cup final where they lost to hosts Argentina.

Dutchman Guus Hiddink went close when he guided co-hosts South Korea to the 2002 World Cup semi-finals and several others have tried and failed.

The most persistent was undoubtedly the Serb itinerant Bora Milutinovic who coached five different countries at the last five World Cups -- Mexico (1986), Costa Rica (1990), United States (1994), Nigeria (1998) and China (2002).

Though he never progressed further than the quarter-finals (with Mexico), Milutinovic did relatively well with largely unfancied teams until China crumbled at the last World Cup. (ESPN)

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Scolari

gdhdannyUID: 125843

Scolari should be thankful for all the genious in his team, while Otto does have something in mind as a coach, I was just thinking about offering him a job as coach of Chinese Olympic team.