Jorge Jesus (Sporting)
15) Jorge Jesus (Sporting)
Jorge Jesus explained when I had to defend and when I should attack, how to hold the position and to be tactically alert. I worked every day tactically with him to improve. He believed in my quality and kept saying, ‘Just do what I ask and slowly you will play better’
- Nemanja Matic, BenficaHe may look like a displaced 1980s soft rocker, his press conference answers may be littered with know-it-all derision, and he may have a recurring habit of upsetting opposing coaches – but make no mistake: Jesus is a quite brilliant football coach.
There is no false modesty with JJ. In fact, there is no modesty at all. “I’m the best coach in the world. I don’t believe anybody knows more about football than me,” he told Sol this time last year.
Such bluster could only pass for a charlatan or a genius. The 60-year-old’s achievements tell us he belongs in the latter category. Jesus single-handedly smashed Porto’s seemingly shatterproof hegemony of Portuguese football. In his six-year spell at Benfica, he first presented the northerners with serious competition where previously they’d had none, before definitively bettering them while playing exhilarating football. He prodigiously developed talents, notwithstanding having to sell his best players year after year.
Having just led Benfica to their first back-to-back championships for 31 years, Jesus sensationally walked out on the Lisbon giants for cross-city rivals Sporting. Why? Money played a part, for sure. But should Jesus triumph at Sporting it will vindicate his claims to be the best, offering persuasive evidence that he is the greatest ever coach in the history of Portuguese club football. Don’t put it past him. TK
Read more at http://www.fourfourtwo.com/features/fourfourtwos-50-best-football-managers-world-2015-15-11#FX61pAILsX5F6lWK.99
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