Rik De Mil, as head coach ad-interim, will finish the current year at Club Brugge, but next season a new face will lead the blue-black troops. Bart Verhaeghe and Vincent Mannaert have provisionally noted 3 candidates on their shortlist: Alfred Schreuder, Dino Toppmöller and Andrea Pirlo. Each of these coaches has his own vision and philosophy, and it remains to be seen which of these three will charm the Bruges club management the most.
ALFRED SCHREUDER
The Dutchman is a free coach after he was fired from Ajax on January 26. Alfred Schreuder already negotiated with Club Brugge a few weeks ago, he was also spotted in the stands of the Jan Breydel stadium during the match against Union SG, but both parties did not reach an agreement on the timing and duration of the employment contract. Schreuder has the great advantage that he is a coach who can come up with a clear idea in the short term and can link that to results almost immediately. In this way he played champion with Club Brugge last season.
Alfred Schreuder has the art of creating consistency and unity in the group of players, bench seat Ruud Vormer called the coach’s training sessions phenomenal and even the best he had ever received, but the football was often not very nice. Club Brugge often played wait-and-see football under the Dutchman and the team mainly chose their moments instead of wanting to dominate and create opportunities. But in addition, Schreuder, despite his excellent results, was also far from undiscussed in the press, the stands, the dressing room and the boardroom of Club Brugge.
When he closed the gates of the Jan Breydel Stadium behind him at the end of last season and moved to Ajax, he was not missed at all at first. In the boardroom, there was a business relationship between Schreuder and the Club Brugge board. It is an open secret that Vincent Mannaert and chairman Bart Verhaeghe like to interfere with their trainer’s work. According to Paul Okon, recently dismissed as assistant coach at Club Brugge, Schreuder was even snapped off at the end of last season, the Australian said a few weeks ago in an interview with THERE.
DINO TOPPMÖLLER
Dino Toppmöller was Julian Nagelsmann’s permanent assistant coach at RB Leipzig and Bayern Munich, but the 42-year-old has been at home unemployed since last Friday. The German played an important role in analyzing and practicing the stagnant phases, preparing and working out the training sessions, and conducting the post-match interviews in place of Nagelsmann. But Toppmöller has already gained experience as a head coach himself, with F91 Dudelange and RE Virton, and he is gradually aspiring to a new adventure as T1.
Dino Toppmöller stands for a possession-oriented approach, in which he wants his team to play offensive, thorough and attractive football. In addition, a high intensity with pressure and counterpress moments is very important in his vision. Toppmöller gets his inspiration not only from Julian Nagelsmann, but also from other German top coaches such as Thomas Tuchel, Jurgen Klopp and Jupp Heynckes. The German has also been described as the ‘player whisperer’ as he has always been very popular with the players at all his clubs.
ANDREA PIRLO
The Gazzetta dello Sport wrote earlier this week that Vincent Mannaert and Bart Verhaeghe think of Andrea Pirlo as the new coach for next season. The Italian likes a club with a modern vision, which has contacts with the major football clubs, with good scouting, a good mix of players and good youth work. Club Brugge therefore meets all these conditions, which means that the West Flemings may well be an interesting track for Pirlo, whose one-year contract with the Turkish mid-engine Karagümrük expires at the end of this season.
As a coach, Andrea Pirlo stands for a passing and possession-oriented vision, not entirely surprising because the Italian himself was a fine-tuned playmaker in his playing career, in a system with two good footballing playmakers. The 43-year-old wants to build his team from the back, keep possession, and recover the ball as quickly as possible when the ball is lost. Pirlo’s motto is not for nothing: “If you don’t control the game, it’s hard to win.” Pirlo prefers to lose his own way instead of lying in front of his own box for 90 minutes.
On the other hand, the intelligent Andrea Pirlo is pragmatic enough to adjust, or nuance, the qualities of the available player material to his general vision. According to Pirlo, the players are much more important than the trainers, and it is the trainers who have to adapt to the players. As a coach, Pirlo mirrors the great Barcelona of Johan Cruijff and Pep Guardiola and the Ajax of Louis van Gaal. But he also admires Italian coaches such as Carlo Ancelotti’s AC Milan and Antonio Conte’s Juventus.
