Humberto Coelho

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Humberto Manuel de Jesus Coelho (born Cedofeita, 20 April 1950) is a Portuguese former footballer and a trainer. As one of the living symbols of Benfica, he was proposed to be a candidate for the clubs presidency in 1996, but he refused.

1 Playing career
2 Managerial career
- 2.1 Portugal
- 2.2 South Korea

[edit] Playing career

As a player, he was one of the best ever central defenders of Portuguese football, representing SL Benfica, from 1968/69 to 1974/75, and from 1977/78 to 1984/85. He also played for Paris Saint-Germain, for the seasons of 1975/76 and 1976/77, where he failed to impress. He won 8 National Champion titles, for the seasons of 1968/69, 1970/71, 1971/72, 1972/73, 1974/75, 1980/81, 1982/83 and 1983/84. He also won 7 Portuguese Cups in 1969, 1970, 1972, 1980, 1981, 1983 and 1985.

His first appearance for the Portuguese national team was at only 18, in a 3-0 win over Romania on 27 October 1968, in Lisbon, the first game of the World Cup 1970 qualifying stage. He represented the national team 64 times, 61 for Benfica and 3 for Paris Saint-Germain, scoring 6 goals, but failed to ever appeared in a major tournament. He played at the Independence Cup in Brazil in 1972, where Portugal lost the final to Brazil 1-0. His last cap for the national team was during the Euro 1984 qualifying stages, in the only defeat that Portugal suffered, on 27 April 1983, beaten 0-5 by U.S.S.R. in Moscow. An injury prevented him from representing the national team for the rest of the qualifying games or in the Euro Cup finals. His last season in Benfica was in 1984/85, but he never played. He, then finished his career to become a trainer.

[edit] Managerial career

[edit] Portugal

As a trainer he never had great success, so he was a surprise choice to replace Artur Jorge as the National Team coach in December 1997. He not only lead Portugal to the Euro 2000 finals, as he achieved the same place as in Euro 1984, losing only at the semi-final to France (1-2), in extra-time.

[edit] South Korea

Early 2003, Coelho took over as the National Team coach of South Korea from Guus Hiddink, he was under a lot of pressure as Korean media wanted their national team to live up to their successful World Cup campaign the year before, however, after 15 games in charge, Coelho stepped down after a humiliating goalless draw against the Maldives, despite winning the East Asian Championship title in December 2003.