Roy Hodgson

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Roy Hodgson (born August 9, 1947) is an English football manager. He is currently the head coach of the Finnish national team.

Hodgson is probably best known for guiding the Swiss national team to the 1994 World Cup and Euro 1996; before that Switzerland hadn't qualified for a major tournament since the 1960s. He has also coached many notable club sides, including Malmö FF, Internazionale, Blackburn Rovers, Grasshoppers, F.C. Copenhagen and Udinese.

Hodgson has served several times as a member of UEFA's technical study group at the European Championships, and he is also a member of the FIFA Technical Study Group (TSG) at the 2006 World Cup. Hodgson has worked as a television pundit in several of the countries in which he has coached as well.

[edit] Biography

Hodgson was born in Croydon and educated at John Ruskin Grammar School. He was a moderately successful player with Crystal Palace before starting his coaching career at Swedish Allsvenskan outfit Halmstads BK in 1976. He spent five years at the club, winning the Swedish championship in 1976 and 1979. In 1980, he moved to Bristol City in his native England, where he was assistant manager and later manager. In 1983, Hodgson moved back to Sweden to take over Örebro SK. In 1985, he took over at Malmö FF, which he led to five consecutive Allsvenskan league championships, two Swedish championships (at the time the Swedish championship was decided through play-offs) as well as two Swedish Cups before moving to Swiss side Neuchâtel Xamax in 1990.

In 1992, Hodgson took over the Swiss national team, which he led to the 1994 World Cup, also reaching the second round, and Euro 1996. Before the start of the European Championships, however, he joined Italian Serie A giants Internazionale, where he worked from 1995 to 1997, reaching the UEFA Cup final in 1996-97. In 1997, he moved back to England to manage Premiership side Blackburn Rovers, which he guided to the UEFA Cup in his first season, but was sacked early in the second season because of poor form. In 1998, he was seriously considered to succeed Berti Vogts as the coach of the German national team, but the German FA decided to appoint a domestic coach instead. In 1999, he had a brief second stint at Inter before returning to Switzerland to coach Grasshoppers for a season.

In 2000, Hodgson was one of three candidates to take over as England manager, but when Sven-Göran Eriksson was chosen, he moved to Denmark to win the Superliga championship with F.C. Copenhagen in 2000-01. In 2001, he broke his contract with F.C. Copenhagen to move to Serie A side Udinese, before taking over as coach of the United Arab Emirates later in the same year. In May 2004, he moved to Norwegian club Viking FK, which he took to the UEFA cup. On August 15, 2005, he agreed to take over as coach of the Finnish national team for the Euro 2008 qualifying campaign. He started in the job in January 2006.

[edit] Coaching career

[edit] Achievements

Preceded by:
Ray Harford
Blackburn Rovers F.C. Manager
1997-1998
Succeeded by:
Brian Kidd
Preceded by:
Christian Andersen
F.C. Copenhagen manager
2000-01
Succeeded by:
Niels-Christian Holmstrøm
Preceded by:
Kjell Inge Olsen
Viking manager
2004-2005
Succeeded by:
Tom Prahl
Switzerland Switzerland squad - 1994 World Cup Switzerland

1 Pascolo | 2 Hottiger | 3 Quentin | 4 Herr | 5 Geiger | 6 Bregy | 7 Sutter | 8 Ohrel | 9 Knup | 10 Sforza | 11 Chapuisat | 12 Lehmann | 13 Egli | 14 Subiat | 15 Grassi | 16 Bickel | 17 Fournier | 18 Rueda | 19 Studer | 20 Sylvestre | 21 Wyss | 22 Brunner | Coach: Hodgson