Rudi GUTENDORF
(1926-2019)
The holder of the world record for
coaching more teams than anyone^
else – although even he himself could
not decide on whether it was 54 or
55 teams – in 32 countries across five
continents, Gutendorf’s career in the
dugout spanned half a century and saw
him lead nine clubs in his native Germany
as well as 18 national sides, including
Australia, China and Fiji.
Born in Koblenz, he played for his
home-town club, TuS Neuendorf, and
found his way into coaching by accident.
While convalescing in Davos after a
lung infection, he heard that Blue Stars
Zurich needed a coach. He did not have
anything as stuffy as a certificate, but as
an admirer of German national coach
Sepp Herberger he felt he knew enough
- and he never looked back.
Football, however, was sometimes the
least challenging aspect of his work.
In Rwanda he contrived to build a
team of players from both Huthu and
Tutsi tribes whose genocidal civil war had
cost more than a million lives. He called
it his “miracle of Kigali – better than a
championship, certainly my greatest
achievement as a coach”.
In Chile, while national boss in the
early 1970s, he would drink whisky with
arrest in his homeland fighting extradition
to the USA.
Former FA chairman Lord Triesmann
famously claimed that in return for
supporting England’s 2018 World Cup
bid, Leoz requested a UK knighthood
and that the FA Cup be named after him.Mamadou TEUW (1959-2019)
Senegalese defender who represented
his country at three Africa Cup of
Nations, including the 1990 tournament
in Algeria when they reached the
semi-finals. As well as his homeland,
he also played in Belgium, where he
represented Club Brugge and Charleroi.Fernando RICKSEN (1976-2019)
Former Holland international who died at
the age of 43 after a six-year battle with
motor neurone disease.
He played for Fortuna Sittard and AZ
in his homeland before joining Rangers in
Scotland and winning two Premiership
titles and five cups. He later won the
Russian Premier League with Zenit.president Salvador Allende – and thus
had to flee in haste after the coup in- The following year Chile went to
the World Cup finals without him.
Although he failed to win a trophy in
his homeland, in the first season of the
newly created Bundesliga, in 1963-64,
he developed a fledgling early version of
pressing with Meiderich SV (now known
as MSV Duisburg). His star player was
Helmut Rahn, West Germany’s 1954
World Cup-winning outside right, and
Gutendorf gave him a racehorse “to keep
him out of the pubs and the bars” as
MSV finished runners-up to Cologne.
Keir Radnedge
Tesfaye GEBREYESUS (1941-2019)
Refereed at six editions of the Africa Cup
of Nations, including the Final in 1970
and 1980, and was later president of
the Eritrea National Football Federation.Nicolas LEOZ (1928-2019)
A former president of leading Paraguayan
club Libertad and then the country’s
football association, he was later
president of CONMEBOL from 1986 to
2013 and served as a member of the
FIFA ExCo, representing South America,
from 1998 to 2013.
After being accused of bribery and
money laundering, he resigned from FIFA
and CONMEBOL, citing health issues,
and spent his final years under houseWORLD SOCCER 17
OBITUARIES
Gustavo Matosas on resigning
as boss of Costa Rica“I live day to day. I didn’t
realise being a national
team coach was so boring”
WORLD SOCCER 17
GLOBAL FOOTBALL INTELLIGENCE
Cup plea...Nicolas LeozBattle...Fernando
RicksenHamburg boss...
Gutendorf with
Kevin Keegan