Dick Advocaat

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Dick Advocaat
Personal information
Full name Dirk Nicolaas Advocaat
Date of birth September 27, 1947 (1947-09-27) (age 60)
Place of birth    The Hague, Netherlands
Playing position Manager
Club information
Current club FC Zenit
Senior clubs1
Years Club App (Gls)*
1966–1973
1973–1977
1977–1979
1979
1979–1980
1980
1980–1982
1982–1983
1983–1984
ADO Den Haag
Roda JC
VVV-Venlo
Chicago Sting
ADO Den Haag
Chicago Sting
Sparta Rotterdam
K. Berchem Sport
FC Utrecht
147 (7)
113 (2)
074 (6)
032 (3)
011 (1)
031 (1)
061 (5)
010 (0)
039 (0)   
Teams managed
1981–1984
1984–1987
1987–1989
1989–1992
1992–1993
1993–1995
1995–1998
1998–2002
2002–2004
2004–2005
2005
2005–2006
2006–Current
DSVP
Netherlands (assistant)
HFC Haarlem
FC Dordrecht
Netherlands (assistant)
Netherlands
PSV Eindhoven
Rangers FC
Netherlands
Borussia Mönchengladbach
United Arab Emirates
South Korea
FC Zenit

1 Senior club appearances and goals
counted for the domestic league only.
* Appearances (Goals)

Dirk Nicolaas "Dick" Advocaat (born September 27, 1947 in The Hague) is the Dutch coach of the Russian football team FC Zenit.

During his career his has been coach of his native Dutch national football team, South Korea and the United Arab Emirates. His nickname is "The Little General", a reference to his mentor Rinus Michels' sobriquet "The General".

Contents

[edit] Playing career

A midfielder during his playing days, the clubs he played for include: ADO Den Haag, VVV-Venlo, Roda JC, Sparta Rotterdam, and FC Utrecht in the Netherlands and Chicago Sting in the United States.


[edit] Coaching career

He moved onto coaching at the age of 32, starting at HFC Haarlem and SVV before becoming assistant to footballing legend Rinus Michels at the Dutch national team.

He led the Dutch team to the quarter-finals of the 1994 World Cup as Head Coach in his first spell in charge (1992-1994). The Dutch, while managing to stave off the infighting which have plagued talented Dutch teams of the past under his tutelage, were defeated by Brazil in the quarter-finals. This signalled the end of Advocaat's debut international coaching career.

He then returned to coaching at club level at first with PSV where he won his first trophy as coach winning the KNVB Cup in 1996 and the Dutch League Championship a year later. In 1998 Advocaat accepted the invitation from Rangers chairman David Murray to become the Scottish Premier League team's new manager.

He successfully reclaimed the Scottish Premier League crown, with his first season in charge culminating with a spectacular treble achievement (two cup victories, as well as the league). Under his tutelage, Rangers played regular bursts of brilliant one-touch football - with recruitments from Holland such as Arthur Numan and Ronald de Boer to the fore. A season later he again won the Scottish League championship and guided Rangers into the Champions League having beaten the UEFA Cup winners Parma in the 3rd round qualifier. However, after claiming it would take Celtic ten years to catch up to Rangers, the arrival of Martin O'Neill at Celtic put pressure on Advocaat as Celtic won a domestic treble in season 2000-01. Marcus Gayle, Paul Ritchie & Tore Andre Flo transferred to Ibrox - the latter for a record £12million - and players such as Jörg Albertz moved to different clubs. Celtic looked like retaining the league championship half way through the next season and as a result Advocaat was moved upstairs from the manager's position. Alex McLeish was appointed as his successor with Advocaat moving to the position of General Manager. After ensuring that Rangers built a first-rate, multi-million pound training facility Murray Park, Dick Advocaat left Rangers for Holland as McLeish went on to have a successful run as Rangers' Manager.

He rejoined the national team set-up following Louis van Gaal's failure to take the national team to the 2002 World Cup in January 2002 and presided over the Netherlands' qualification for Euro 2004 via the play-offs. Holland had finished second in their group behind the Czech Republic and therefore went into a play-off in order to qualify for Euro 2004. They managed to achieve this after a 6-1 aggregate win over Scotland but not before surviving a harrowing encounter: losing 1-0 in the first leg in Scotland. Advocaat was criticised by the Dutch media, so much so that several of the team's players refused to speak to the media even after the comfortable and inspired 6-0 victory in the return leg at the Amsterdam ArenA.

Despite taking Holland to the semi-final stage of Euro 2004, the Dutch media were critical of Advocaat. Holland were beaten 2-1 by Portugal in the semi-finals of Euro 2004 after a dismal performance. The team also made several criticisms of his tactics, especially those in the team's shock loss to the Czech Republic in the second game of the first round of the tournament. In that game, after Netherlands lost their two goal lead against the Czechs, Advocaat made a tactical change that shocked even his own players as he brought on the ageing Paul Bosvelt in the midfield position replacing crowd favorite Arjen Robben who had been contributing immensely throughout the match. The Czechs seized the opportunity to capitalise on it and scored the decisive goal. Shortly after the tournament, with mounting pressure and even death threats, Advocaat quit his job as head coach on July 6, 2004. He then went briefly back into club management with the German team Borussia M'gladbach, however he resigned on 18 April 2005 after less than six months at the helm.

In July 2005, he took a job as coach of United Arab Emirates, but quit in September to work with Korea Republic's national team. Expectations were high after the Koreans' achievements on home soil in the 2002 FIFA World Cup. The 2006 edition saw Korea get its first win on away soil in the FIFA World Cup with a 2-1 victory over Togo. They also scored a late equalizer to draw 1-1 against veterans France, and the results of the two games put them in a position to qualify from Group G. However, Korea failed to make it into the round of 16 after a 2-0 loss against Switzerland, while France had defeated Togo 2-0 to advance; a disappointing end to what had been a promising start for the Koreans.

Since July of 2006, Advocaat has been working with FC Zenit in Saint Petersburg, Russia, assisted by his compatriot Cor Pot. In 2006, he led his team to 4th place in the Russian Premier league, earning a place in the 2007-2008 UEFA Cup. The next year, his team succeeded in winning the Russian Premier League [1] for the first time in the team's history playing in the Russian Premier League, becoming the first foreign coach to win the Russian championship and enabling him to land a $4 million-a-year extension from the team, despite the fact he had already agreed on a deal to manage the Australian National Team.[2][3] With Advocaat, Zenit reached the final of the UEFA Cup for the first time in their history after beating Bayern Munich (1:1 in Munich and 4:0 in St. Petersburg) in the semifinals.

On May 14 2008, at The City of Manchester Stadium, Advocaat's Russian team defeated his former side Rangers F.C. 2-0, to claim the Uefa cup.

[edit] Managerial honours

With SVV

With PSV Eindhoven

With Rangers

With FC Zenit

On 28 May 2008 Advocaat was honoured when he was granted the honorary citizenship of the city of Saint Petersburg, in recognition of his achievements with FC Zenit, making him the city's first foreign honorary citizen since 1866.[4]

[edit] See also

[edit] References

[edit] External links

Awards
Preceded by
Flag of Spain Juande Ramos
UEFA Cup winning manager
2007–08
Succeeded by
Incumbent
Preceded by
none
Scottish Football Writers' Association Manager of The Year
1999-2000
Succeeded by
Flag of Northern Ireland Martin O'Neill