Top ten managers who never played football – including FOUR former Chelsea bosses
JOSE MOURINHO ‘sacked’ himself as a player – but he’s not the only top manager who couldn’t hack it on the pitch.
“Don’t do as I play, do as I say” might be the motto of the ten we’ve selected – after they defied their inability or poor luck as footballers to make it big as bosses.
Four of them managed Chelsea and two of them Liverpool.
And one’s become the youngest Bundesliga manager in history.
The one thing they seem to have in common is making an early commitment to coaching.
Here are the tales of the managers who, rather than has-beens, are a bunch of never-was’s.
Gerard Houllier
The Frenchman was not known to have had any professional career.
However, he played for seven years at amateur club Le Touquet, where he would get his first managerial job between 1973 and 1976.
He would then guide amateur club Noeux-les-Mines to the second tier before moving to Lens.
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A successful spell there would see him take over at PSG before he became his national team boss but failed to guide them to the World Cup.
Later, he would guide Liverpool to two League Cups, an FA Cup and a Uefa Cup before being replaced by Rafa Benitez.
Two Ligue 1 titles with Lyon would follow before he finished his career with an unsuccessful spell at Aston Villa.
Arrigo Sacchi
“I didn’t know that to be a jockey, you have to have been a horse,” was Sacchi’s response when asked about managing with no playing experience.
One of the greatest bosses of all time, Sacchi earned his money as a shoe salesman while managing his local club because he wasn’t good enough to play for them.
And indeed he galloped to glory as a manager.
Having started at Fusignano aged 27 in 1973, he reached the big time with Parma in 1987, later bossing AC Milan twice, Italy, Atletico Madrid and finally with Parma again.
He guided the Azzurri to the 1994 World Cup final, also winning Serie A in his first full year at Milan.
Jose Mourinho
The Special One’s first brutal tactical decision was to end his own playing carer.
Deciding he lacked the pace and power to thrive as a striker, Mourinho quit the lower-league Portugal game to coach at a school and then for hometown club Vitória de Setúbal.
But while captaining his last team, Comércio e Indústria, he put football in perspective by saving the life of a team-mate trapped in a burning car.
Mourinho, whose dad won a single cap for Portugal, sprang to prominence with coaching/translator roles under English managerial legend Bobby Robson.
He launched his own life in the hot-seat at Benfica and Uniao de Leiria before fame struck at Porto from 2002-4, with two Portuguese titles plus Champions League glory.
Since then he’s won silverware aplenty at Chelsea twice, Inter Milan, Real Madrid and Manchester United, before completing the clean sweep of European trophies with current club Roma.
Carlos Alberto Parreira
The three-time Brazil manager bossed five different nations at the World Cup – despite not having a shred of a playing career.
The 1994 World Cup winner even launched his career aged 24, bossing Ghana in 1967.
Apart from four spells in charge of home-country giants Fluminense, he was also entrusted by Kuwait, the UAE and Saudi Arabia, plus South Africa when they hosted the 2010 World Cup.
Parreira only managed twice in Europe, with Valencia and then taking Fenerbahçe to the Turkish crown.
Avram Grant
Even in this list of managerial early-starters, the Israeli deserves special mention.
Grant coached the youth team of home-town club Hapoel Petah Tikva at the age of 18.
He finally landed the top job there 14 years later, winning the Toto Cup twice.
Grant most notably bossed Maccabi Tel Aviv and Israel before his friend Roman Abramovich made him Chelsea boss in 2007.
But runners-up spot in both the Prem and Champions League failed to save him from the axe at the end of his first season.
After that, he bossed Portsmouth, West Ham and Partizan Belgrade, followed by Ghana and, since, December 2022, Zambia.
Andre Villas Boas
Never quite the Special One II, but the Portuguese was given his first off-the-field job aged SIXTEEN by then-Porto chief Bobby Robson.
AVB, already fluent in English, found himself chatting to Robson as they lived in the same apartment block.
And the Newcastle legend appointed him to Porto’s observation department.
Robson then helped Villas-Boas storm through his qualifications, getting the C licence in Scotland at 17, the B a year later and the top-level a licence aged 19.
Two years later he took the obvious career choice of becoming… technical director for the British Virgin Islands.
But AVB then became Mourinho’s assistant at Porto, Chelsea and Inter before himself bossing Academica and Porto, with whom he won the treble of top-flight title, Portugal Cup and Europa league in 2010-11.
But he failed to win silverware in a year apiece at Chelsea and Tottenham.
AVB went on to lift the Russian crown with Zenit but was then trophyless with Shanghai SIPG and Marseille.
Brendan Rodgers
The Northern Irishman is different from many on this list – as his promising playing career was ended by a genetic knee condition aged 20.
The ex-schoolboy international defender began with local team Ballymena United before starring for Reading reserves until quitting as a pro in 1993.
Unusually, he stayed on as a Royals’ youth coach while playing for non-League clubs Newport IOW, Witney Town and Newbury and working at John Lewis.
Mourinho then lured him to coach Chelsea’s Academy before he impressed in charge of Watford, Reading and Swansea with stylish, tactically-astute football.
He missed out on honours during three years bossing Liverpool, but won the League and Cup double in successive season for Celtic, earning a Prem return with Leicester in 2019.
He steered he Foxes to historic FA Cup glory two years later.
But where might he be now if he hadn’t had to stop playing so early?
Maurizio Sarri
The Italian’s purely-amateur playing career had its “if only” moments – even after he had failed trials with Torino and Fiorentina.
The centre-back was a one-club man with local team Figline until injuries led to his retirement aged 30.
His nearly moment came at 19 when a move to Montevarchi was only foiled by Figline demanding a massive compensation fee.
Sarri also rejected a move to Pontedera.
And since turning to coaching in 1990 he’s managed TWENTY-ONE clubs.
Guiding the 17th of those teams, Empoli, to Serie B runners-up spot in 2014, helped transform his progress.
He moved on to Napoli, Chelsea (where he won the Europa League), Juventus (Serie A winners) and now Lazio.
Julian Nagelsmann
Like Rodgers, the German’s hopes of a decent playing career were wrecked by injury before he really got started.
He captained 1860 Munich’s youth team and made it into the reserve-team squad, only to suffer knee problems.
Similar misfortune after switching to Thomas Tuchel’s Augsburg, so he stopped playing aged 20, becoming a scout and studying sports science.
Spells in youth coaching at 1860 Munich and 1899 Hoffenheim followed.
And in 2016, aged 28, Hoffenheim made him the youngest manager in Bundesliga history and he somehow kept them up
After bossing RB Leipzig from 2019 to 2021, he’s now gunning for his second successive Bundesliga title with Bayern Munich.
Ron Noades
The late Londoner was completely devoid of a playing or coachign background, instead entering football through investment as a businessman.
He was involved in the ownership of FOUR clubs in turn- starting with non-league Southall.
He then became part of Wimbledon’s early rise up the lower divisions as chairman – famously appointing Dave Bassett as boss.
Moving to a similar position at Selhurst Park, he oversaw arguably Crystal Palace‘s brightest ever spell.
They won promotion to the top flight in 1989, reached the FA Cup final the following year and came third at the highest level in 1991.
But he sparked a furore that year with comments about the racial mix of the Eagles’ team, with key men Ian Wright, Mark Bright and Andy Gray departing in the fall-out.
Palace went topsy-turvy after that – none more so than when Noades sold his interest to Mark Goldberg and also became CARETAKER-MANAGER, albeit failing to save them from the drop.
Terry Venables came in as his successor and Noades left the club – ending up as chairman and then manager of Brentford.
He won promotion to the third tier in his first term.
But one of the more controversial careers in chairmanship/management ended in 2000, when he sold his majority shareholding to fans’ group Bees United and quit both roles.