Forgotten heroes pt. 1: Wiel Coerver

Funnily enpugh, we hardly read his name in the list of famous Dutch coaches… Rinus Michels, Kees Rijvers, Guus Hiddink, Johan Cruyff, Frank Rijkaard, Leo Beenhakker, Louis van Gaal… But we never see the name of Wiel Coerver… What is the reason that we forgot him, and that we (we The Dutch) totally neglect and ignore his legacy (not that he’s dead or something…)?

Coerver (born in 1924) is one of the few Dutch coaches to win a European Cup (out of the top of my head: JC, Frank Rijkaard, Rinus Michels, Bert van Marwijk, Louis van Gaal, Guus Hiddink…did I leave one out??), with Feyenoord in 1974 he won the UEFA Cup

Wiel started as a player for Rapid JC (became Roda JC later) and made a name as a innovative coach for Roda, JC, Sparta Rotterdam, NEC and Feyenoord. Coerver’s teams always played technical, Dutch-school football. Passing, positioning-play and attacking (where did we hear this before?).

But, Wiel was not the easiest man to work with, though… He was stubborn, dominant and 200% passionate about his philosophy… After Feyenoord, he decided to move abroad: he worked for the Indonesian football association as team manager and would later work all around the globe….. As coach and as coach-the-coach coach (huh?), organizing clinics for coaches. In those days, he developed his Coerver-method which would become a world-famous method, endorsed and applauded by millions all over the world, except for…yep…The Netherlands…

The focus of Coerver’s method and the core of his philosophy is: command over the ball. His theory is, if you control the ball better than the opponent, you will win the game. So, ball-control and being-boss in one-to-one situations… Therefore, ball-technique and skills are the main ingredient of his material.

Coerver had many young Dutch talents under his wing, the most famous being Bolo Zenden, Kees van Wonderen (ex-Feyenoord captain) and Jan Peters (former AZ and Oranje midfielder…) and won the hearts of many international football experts. Some examples: Raf Benitez, Alex Ferguson, Osvaldo Ardiles, Gerard Houillier, Jurgen Klinsmann, Liam Brady and Carlos Perreira. John Meulensteen, one of Wiel’s assistants, even made it as Manchester United’s technical skills-coach under Sir Alex.

According to Coerver, any player with average skills - at any age! - can learn to master the ball and be boss in one-to-one situations like the best of them, after only six months of training!

There are dozens of Coerver schools all over the world and his books are being sold in all bookstores, again, except for in Holland…

So what’s with the Dutch? Why don’t we like Wiel? Why doesn’t the KNVB endorse his method, to inject some quality in our failing youth development?

Some say JC blacklisted Wiel, because Wiel could maybe chuck El Salvador of his pedestal… Others say Wiel was welcome at the KNVB but wanted too much money… And then some say Wiel is just to hard to work with… And there’s people who claim the KNVB doesn’t want to lose face after decades of ignoring him… Coerver adept Ricardo Moniz worked as technique coach for PSV but left for Tottenham Hotspur… Pijnders was the next Coerver man who left for FC Porto (pretty big name clubs)… And the KNVB’s official line is: Coerver method? Bullocks… If you have talent, you have talent…if you don’t, you will never be able to get it….