Ange Postecoglou, Arsène Wenger, Carlos Queiroz – top managers made their names in the J.League

In urgent need of rebuilding after missing out on European competition, Tottenham Hotspur have brought in Ange Postecoglou as a new manager.

Having won the J1 League with Yokohama F. Marinos in 2019 and back-to-back Scottish Premiership titles with Celtic from 2021, the Australian has made an impressive career progression through an unusual route from the J.League to Europe, and then to big European clubs.

Looking back on the history of the J.League, which celebrated its 30th anniversary this year, it is clear that Postecoglou is not the first football coach to make their names in Japan.

The most prominent example is Arsène Wenger, who led Nagoya Grampus from 1995 for one and a half years. After a seven-season reign at AS Monaco, reaching the Champions League semi-finals in the 1993-94 season, the Frenchman chose Nagoya for a new challenge in Asia. 

In his first season of 1995, Nagoya finished fourth in the first half of the season (the league followed a split-season format at the time) and made a second-place finish in the second half as well as they won the inaugural title of the Emperor Cup for the club. Because of the feat, Wenger was chosen for the best manager award in the season.   

Used to be called “baggage of the J.League” for their miserable beginnings from the start of the league in 1993, Nagoya had been changed radically and quickly to get better by Wenger. The transformation shocked football fans in Japan. Although his new challenge seemed to be going extremely well, Wenger confessed differently in his book, The Esprit of Winners. 

How did the Arsenal offer come?

“From my first year at Nagoya, I had offers from several European teams. In my second year in Nagoya I noticed that the number had decreased. It was clear that staying in Japan would send a message that I did not want to return to Europe.”

Wenger, however, received an unexpected offer from Arsenal and returned to Europe in the late summer of 1995. The rest is history. 

As Wenger said, it is not easy to get a job at a European club after coaching in the J.League, especially at a big European club. In this respect, Carlos Queiroz, who followed in Wenger’s footsteps at Nagoya in 1996, is a rare example of a manager whose career took off highly from the J.League.

During an 18 month stint at Nagoya, he led the team to second finish in the first season but was dismissed in the second season with ninth place. After that he went on to become assistant coach at Manchester United in between managing UAE and South Africa national teams, before being appointed as coach of Real Madrid in 2003. But the first season ended in fourth place in the league and he left the Galácticos. Since then he has mainly coached national teams, including Portugal and Iran. 

Two years before Queiroz became Real Madrid manager, Carlos Reschak coached FC Barcelona, and he had experience of a J.League manager as well. He introduced a 3-4-3 attacking system to now-defunct Yokohama Flügels in 1998, and picked the-then teenage rookie Yasuhito Endo for a regular in the midfield. As for the progress Endo made after, breaking the record of the most appearances for a Japan national team player, Japanese football fans eventually admire Reschak much. 

Also, there are two South American – both are Brazilians – who have risen through the ranks from the J.League club to national teams. Émerson Leão started to manage Shimizu S-Pulse from 1992, even before the start of the J.League, and later won the Emperor’s Cup with Verdy Kawasaki (currently Tokyo Verdy) in 1996. And Luiz Felipe Scolari took charge of Iwata in 1997, and went onto lead Brazil to World Cup triumph in 2002, as well as to reach Euro 2004 final with Portugal, and then managed Chelsea too.

If Postecoglou performs well in the coming seasons, the value of the J.League coaching market is sure to increase.