With Graham Arnold struck down by COVID this week, his trusted right hand man Rene Meulensteen has taken charge of training for Australia’s key World Cup Qualifier against Vietnam. Tom Smithies examines the crucial role of staff behind the scenes.
You get a lot of double acts in comedy and coaching. In both cases, it’s the spark between two individuals that creates the magic.
Most head coaches have an assistant they trust and believe in. Often they come as a package in a new job, with the senior figure needing the counsel of someone who understands how they operate.
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For Jose Mourinho it was Rui Faria for a long time, following him from Chelsea to Inter to Real Madrid to Manchester United. Carlo Ancelotti had Paul Clement at numerous clubs until the latter stepped out on his own. Bert van Marwijk brought the same support staff from the Dutch national team to the Socceroos and now (twice) to the UAE.
Other times coaches will handpick an assistant they know of. Guus Hiddink picked Pim Verbeek to work with him in South Korea, and then Johan Neeskens with the Socceroos. Patrick Vieria appointed as his assistant at Crystal Palace a Welsh coach who had overseen Veira’s Pro-Licence coaching course. Either way, these relationships are crucial to a team’s success.
Yet should the Matildas be successful at the Asian Cup, it will speak to a different kind of dynamic at the heart of the coaching staff. When Tony Gustavsson first “met” his assistant Mel Andreatta over a Zoom call last year, as he was being appointed Matildas head coach, the pair knew nothing of each other beyond their respective CVs.
The craziness of a COVID world since has helped to shape a remarkable alliance where the majority of interactions have been virtual, but where Gustavsson has invested remarkable trust in his No 2. She has in effect been his eyes and ears in Australia, as well as a valued sounding board and collaborator in the development of the rest of the overall squad. “Some things,” Gustavsson says, “are just meant to be. From the first couple of conversations with Mel I felt she’s a phenomenal person.”
Gustavsson’s decision to spend the vast majority of his time overseas has not been uncontroversial, particularly in terms of identifying future talent. For a variety of reasons, personal and professional, he explains why it has been necessary in his eyes to be overseas – mainly down to scouting layers outside of Australia, as well as border closures and his family commitments. But the net result has been to make Andreatta a crucial part of the team’s fortunes, and an obvious candidate to succeed him eventually.
“She’s actually exactly what I need both from a personality standpoint, but also from a professional standpoint,” Gustavsson tells KEEPUP. “And I think it’s a really good mix. So even though it was frustrating with COVID, me not being able to come into Äustralia (as much as planned) it actually feels like this is a really good setup.
“We kind of get the best out of two worlds where she’s doing a really good job in the local landscape. And I don’t think she gets enough credit for it to be honest. I guess it’s that classic one where you look at the head coach to do everything and and if the head coach is not doing it, it doesn’t maybe get the same status or same recognition. Mel is doing so much and maybe not getting enough credit for it.”
The dynamic between the coaches can vary enormously. Ange Postecoglou’s assistants have usually taken most of the actual training sessions wherever he has coached, leaving him to observe. Other No2s are there to brainstorm ideas.
When Socceroos coach Graham Arnold was pursuing his Pro-Licence badge years ago he went to Manchester United to observe training methods. Sir Alex Ferguson asked his then No 2, Rene Meulensteen, to help Arnold, and the two got on immediately. Years later, when Arnold left Sydney FC to become national team head coach, he approached Meulensteen to assist him.
“I knew Arnie as a player from Holland, and we got on well when he came to Old Trafford, but most of all I can laugh at the gobbledegook Dutch he tries to speak,” laughs Meulensteen who also worked with Guus Hiddink.
“I think the relationship between a head coach and their assistant needs a few things to be really successful. You have to be on the same page tactically, and want to play a similar kind of football.
“You need personalities that work with each other; if the head coach doesn’t say so much, his assistant will have to be loud with the players, or the other way round. Also, the assistant cannot be a yes-man, you have to be able to challenge the boss’s ideas in a way that works.
“But I think most of all you need a spark between you as personalities, so you enjoy working together. That’s the core of it.”
Andreatta has spoken of the trust Gustavsson has placed in her, and the scope she has to run individual player programs, for instance, or coach the detail of the game plan.
“How do we work together? As a coach I don’t like to micromanage,” Gustavsson says. “I like to delegate to people in my staff and have the trust in them to do things that we need to get done.
“It’s evaluating the skill set of the staff around me and then delegating the right things. It’s like a right hand to me, so to speak. When people talk to me they talk to Mel, and when people talk to Mel they talk to me. We work very closely together and even in assembly (in camp), not just outside of assembly. Even in assembly we work together with the actual team, she works very closely with me in the team.”
