Reporter Han Bing reported that as the largest group of foreign teachers in the Chinese professional league, nearly 100 people in the former Yugoslavia have coached in China, although there are many losers, but there are also many successes, among which Xhosa, Santrachi, Tuba and Stowe are among the representatives.
As a player, Xhosa was not successful, and after becoming a coach, the resume that could be obtained was that he became the manager of Red Star in the 1997/98 season, but he was robbed of the championship by the Serbian warlord "Tiger" Alkán, who supported Obirić, and was forced to leave the class in less than halfway through the 1998/1999 season.
In 1999, when Wanda transferred its shares to Shide and a generation of overlords fell to the brink of relegation, it was only when he remembered that he was recommended by the old coach Boskov to come to Wuhan to coach Xhosa.
Xhosa's record in Wuhan was not good, failing to help the team relegation, winning only two of 12 games, but his coaching level is obvious to all. Moreover, Xhosa, who was extremely angry, wanted to compete with Milu, Peter Sr. and Santracci, who were also in China at that time, and prove that he was not inferior to them. In the context of dalian football gradually transforming from Wanda to Shide, Xosa was successful.
The league took on direct rivals Peter Sr. and Santraci, and Xhosa both won, both in terms of football rivalry and personal grudges. After the turmoil of 1999, Wanda has injected funds from Success and become the hegemon again in the 21st century. Compared with several of his competitors, Xhosa is lucky, top foreign aid plus powerful players, Shide won the league three consecutive championships without suspense, but at the same time let the outside world question that Xhosa is standing on the "shoulders of giants".
In fact, it was the critical period for the Chinese team to impact the World Cup finals, and Shide was selected by many internationals, but Xhosa dared to promote new players, coupled with the excellent performance of Jangovich and Nicholas, the team showed great strength. Unfortunately, the Chinese football environment has undergone earth-shaking changes, the Fiasco in the World Cup has punctured the bubble of false prosperity, coupled with the black whistle of match-fixing, The Success Group has the intention of withdrawing, coupled with the aging of players and the large number of competitions in 2003, Xhosa magic is no longer there, and Success only won the 3rd place. In the middle of the 2004 season, Xhosa was unable to return to the sky, and the club's refusal to invest meant that the title race was hopeless, so it was sealed. Later, Xhosa also fought the fire late in the 2008 season, and although it was a thrilling success, it was still not trusted by the top and eventually gave way to Xu Hong.
Like Tuba, Xosa remained active in qiannan football after leaving Shaanxi in 2011, but the team he coached gradually "relegated" and almost never had a full season. In February, Xhosa had just been discharged from Serbia's Niš Workers' Team. At the peak of his coaching career, Xosa stayed in Dalian, and without the human and financial resources that Dalian gave him, he never proved his strength again.
Tuba is not the first former South Coach to succeed in the Chinese League, With Santracci winning the Double for Luneng and Milosi winning a League third place for Quanxing, but Tuba is one of the most successful Former Yugoslavia coaches coached in China, having won two league titles (2006 and 2008), two FA Cups (2004 and 2006) and one Chinese Super League (2004) in Luneng's six years of coaching. In addition, In the 1990s, Tuba led the guerrillas to suppress the sworn enemy Red Star almost completely, winning the former Yugoslav League championship six times in 10 years.
In 2003, due to contract process problems with Saudi powerhouse Nasser, Luneng, who had been paying attention to Tuba, seized the opportunity, when, after the failure of two Russian coaches, Luneng put his hopes back on the former South coach who had led the team to success. This time, Luneng won the greatest coach in the history of the team. Santracci ended the history of Luneng's professional league without a title, Anduba created Luneng's golden age and ended Wanda's monopoly on Chinese football, just as he ended the Monopoly of Red Star in the former Yugoslavia.
The transformation brought by Tuba is not just 4 trophies, but a complete change in the style of Shandong football. Delicate pass control, high-profile offensive football, a change in the previous Luneng up to 10 years of simple and rough defensive counterattack style, won the Chinese Super League Cup and the FA Cup "small double", but also for luneng to dominate the Chinese Super League, laid the technical and tactical and psychological foundation, especially the first game of Tuba's debut: the first round of the 2004 chinese Super League, but also the first round of the entire history of the Chinese Super League, Luneng away to Shanghai Shenhua, although the final 1-2 loss, but that game Luneng showed a smooth ground cooperation, Let the entire Chinese football world be shocked - is this still the impression of the "brown brother" Luneng?
In 2005, with Danchunessuscu and Basin, plus top local players such as Zheng Zhi, Li Xiaopeng, Li Jinyu and Song Lihui, Luneng began to attack the championship. Although the final four were empty, Luneng has shown the strength to replace Dalian as the new hegemon of Chinese football; in 2006, Zhivkovic and Li Leilei joined, Luneng was far ahead, six rounds in advance at the end of August, shandong fans fell into the fanaticism of winning the championship, but also let Luneng taste the taste of the double for the second time. Moreover, Tuba's team also set a record of 13 consecutive league wins, unprecedented, even Lippi, Scolari and Cannavaro coached Evergrande, can not do, Tuba also with the 2006 season performance, the first time in Serbian coaching, this is the first time in the former Yugoslavia and Serbian football, because of the coach's performance in Asian football awarded this honor.
The 2006 season is the peak of Tuba, and with Zheng Zhi leaving the team to stay in the yang, Han Peng, Wang Yongpo and other main players were seriously injured, coupled with the national team to draw too many players and the changes in the mood of the players after winning the championship, although 2008 still won the championship, but luck accounted for a large part, after the season, he can completely retreat in the rapids, but chose to advance and retreat together, and finally left the class. Comprehensive analysis of Tuba's coaching, 2004 to 2006 is a high, 2007 to 2009 is a gradual decline, the change of personnel is actually the most critical factor, in the absence of players who can fully perform offensive football, Tuba coaching in the later period, Luneng's control has declined significantly.
From arriving in strange China in 2004 with an annual salary of $400,000 to leaving in 2009 with 5 trophies and an annual salary of one million US dollars, Tuba left Luneng with not only memories of the golden age, he also cultivated a generation of rookies, and his wisdom and stubbornness are impressive.
The wealth left by Tuba is also extremely precious, such as Li Xiaopeng, who is now coaching Shandong Luneng, in his coaching philosophy and style, there is a mark of Tuba, in the previous interview, Li Xiaopeng also has great respect for Tuba, including Tuba's coaching style is also very admirable, of course, limited by the current Luneng personnel structure and the competitive environment of the Chinese Super League, Li Xiaopeng takes the initiative to increase the transmission control factor on the basis of practical football. Four years later, Tuba returned to China, when Zhuoer "intercepted" from Guoan for a high price of $2 million. Although he was eventually fired for poor performance, he still got enough respect from the fans in Wuhan.
After leaving China, Tuba is still active, he has served as the coach of the Montenegro and Serbian national teams, last June for refusing to lead the team to a kosovo match that Serbia does not recognize, and on the match day, all members of the coaching staff were dismissed by the Montenegro Football Association, and then he was appointed as the manager of the Serbian national team, leading the team from C to B as the first in the group. The European Championship qualifier play-offs were scheduled for March due to the indefinite postponement of the COVID-19 pandemic.
Tuba's player's resume is not worth mentioning, but Santraci is a former South League 4-time Golden Boot, and the player era is by no means inferior to the Red Star double stars "Elf" Stojkovic and "Pigeon" Vladeau, only because he spent most of his time playing for a mid-range team like Belgrade Youth, he did not have the same achievements as the two. However, in the coaching era, Santracci started from a very high point, starting to coach the former Yugoslavia national team in 1994, and together with Pieter, who had coached Shenhua and Sichuan, he brought the team to the World Cup in France.
After the World Cup, Santracci resigned, at that time, he received a large number of invitations, hired Kim Jong-nam's poor record Luneng, decided to change his mind, focusing on the big-name coaches in Europe, Santrachi became the first choice, the then general manager of Luneng Shao Kenan took care of Maolu, Santracci also decided to come to China to take risks, for this reason, he refused the temptation of the UAE Football Association to double the annual salary.
After coaching, in addition to drastically reforming the team's skills and tactics, Santraci also focused on improving the self-confidence of the players, using Savičević (Su Maozhen), Zidane (Song Lihui) and Maradona (Song Yuming) as nicknames for the players, and Luneng quickly got on the right track.
After three months of difficult running-in, coupled with the new foreign aid in place, especially the sniper shenhua away in July, it marked the transformation of Santracci's Transformation of Luneng, basically completed. In the end, Luneng stood out against the background of the difficult problems of the main title rivals, won the first professional league championship, and then defeated Wanda in the final of the FA Cup to win the first double title of the Chinese professional league. Sandratch broke Wanda and Shenhua's monopoly on the league title and responded to all the doubters.
It is worth mentioning that 1999 can be described as an eventful autumn, the Kosovo War broke out, the former Yugoslavia experienced the largest war chaos in Europe after World War II, and at the same time, the "5.8" incident of the US military bombing the Chinese embassy in the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia occurred. Under tremendous mental pressure, Santrachi insisted on coaching in China and finally completed a mission that seemed impossible to outsiders.
More importantly, in the Santracci era, Luneng Club laid the foundation for Luneng Football School, which became the beginning of the club's systematic youth training after the professionalization of Chinese football, which is conducive to the present and the great achievement of thousands of autumns. Luneng has been leading in the field of domestic youth training for twenty years, it can be said that there is a credit to Santracci, he has always adhered to the football concept of vigorously developing youth training, and also vigorously used and cultivated young players in the process of leading the team.
In The Chinese tour of Santrachi, he once almost associated with the Chinese national team, in the national team coaching plan in early 2000, Santracci was the main alternative, the Chinese Football Association and Luneng and Santracci conducted many negotiations, but in the end Santracci stayed in Luneng, the Chinese Football Association hired Milu, at this point, Santrachi's fate came to a watershed: Milu led the Chinese national team to successfully advance to the final round of the 2002 World Cup at the end of 2001. Santrasch left before the end of the 2000 season.
After leaving Luneng in 2000, Santracci also returned to China three times to coach, joining Kinder, Zhongneng and Shaanxi, but unfortunately did not succeed. After 2011, Santraci said goodbye to his coaching career, and in 2016, the Luneng Meritorious Coach who started the South China Super League wave died of a heart attack.
Compared with the big-name predecessors who have previously coached and taught prominently, Stowe is obviously not amazing enough, but Stowe, nicknamed "Elf" in the player era, was once a big star of Red Star and won the Champions League trophy with Marseille.
In 2001, at the age of 36, Stowe was elected president of the Football Association of Serbia and Herzegovina, and the biggest achievement in his tenure was that Serena reached the final round of the World Cup, but at that time, he had a disagreement with the then national team coach Pitt, and after that, he became the president of the Red Star team, and the first thing he did when he took office was to fire Radeko, who later coached Shide, and then used his connections when he played in Japan to bring Toyota for the club to sponsor, but he was still powerless to save red star in financial crisis.
In early 2008, Stowe returned to Japan to coach Nagoya, in the summer of 2015, he was recruited by R&F for a high price of $2.5 million, as soon as he debuted, it made the Chinese Super League shine, at this time, the Chinese Super League, has long been no longer the world of the former South Coach, in the 2015 season, only he and Yatai Croatian Tot.
No one expected that Stowe had become the representative of the former South Coach of the Chinese Super League in the past 5 years. Although Okuka (Teda), Taradzic (Jianye), Stano (Renhe), and Stojanovic (Yatai) also had short stays, nothing was left.
To be precise, the impact of Stowe on R&F is no less than the qualitative change that Tuba brought to Luneng that year, but his team, because of the limitations of its own capital, cannot prove itself with the championship trophy. But just like Okuka in Jiangsu, Stowe has created a gorgeous enough offensive football style for R&F, he did not catch up with his predecessor Eriksen's achievements in the league, nor did he lead the team to the AFC Champions League, but R&F has become one of the most distinctive and most admiring teams in the Chinese Super League in the 52 months under his rule.
Zahavi's two Golden Boot awards, one for the Chinese Super League MVP, are both proof of the Israelis' strong individual abilities and the best proof of Stowe's offensive football. He can live his personality in the shadow of Evergrande, and he is always full of passion when he is in the Guangzhou derby, and constantly proves himself with victory. R&F fans, will not forget the excitement of the Guangzhou derby, 2017 Yuexiu Mountain twice 4-2, 2018 celestial 5-4, of course, people can not forget the 2017 FA Cup second leg was Evergrande 7-2 reversal.
Stowe, who left R&F, is still enjoying his vacation, his wife is quarantined in Paris, France because of the epidemic, and the Serbian media has rumored that he may succeed Tuba as the manager of the national team, but he has denied it. For Stowe, football is not the most important thing now, and after the epidemic, he may choose a new country and reinterpret his football philosophy.