Louis van Gaal
Aloysius Paulus Maria "Louis" van Gaal is a Dutch former football manager as well as former player who currently serves as an advisor for Ajax. At club level, he served as manager of Ajax, Barcelona, AZ, Bayern Munich and Manchester United, as well as having three spells in charge of the Netherlands national team. Nicknamed the "Iron Tulip", Van Gaal has won 20 major honours in his managerial career at club level.
Before his career as a coach, Van Gaal played as a midfielder for Royal Antwerp, Telstar, Sparta Rotterdam, Ajax and AZ. He is also a qualified physical education teacher, and worked at high schools during his career as a semi-professional footballer. After a brief spell as an assistant coach at AZ, Van Gaal served as an assistant under Leo Beenhakker at Ajax, and eventually took over as head coach in 1991. Under his lead, the club won three Eredivisie titles, the UEFA Cup and the UEFA Champions League. He moved to Barcelona in 1997 and won two league titles and one Copa del Rey, but left after disagreements with the club's hierarchy.
Van Gaal was then appointed at the Netherlands, but failed to qualify for the 2002 FIFA World Cup. This preceded another brief spell at Barcelona, before he returned to AZ, where he won an Eredivisie title, the club's second ever in its history. He moved to Bayern Munich in 2009, and in Germany won the Bundesliga, the DFB-Pokal and reached the final of the UEFA Champions League. He returned to manage the Netherlands for a second time, where he led the nation to a third-place finish at the 2014 FIFA World Cup. He was appointed manager of Manchester United later that summer, where he won the FA Cup before he was dismissed only days later. Despite announcing his retirement in 2019, due to family reasons, Van Gaal returned to management in August 2021, when he was appointed as head coach of the Netherlands for a third time. He retired from management after the 2022 FIFA World Cup.
Playing and early coaching career
Van Gaal was born in Amsterdam. As a youngster, he started playing for the Amsterdam amateur side RKSV de Meer. At the age of 20, he joined the second team of Ajax, but was never chosen to play in the first team, which at the time boasted players such as Johan Cruyff and Johan Neeskens in the midfield positions. He was loaned to Belgian First Division side Royal Antwerp playing under Guy Thys with whom he was runner-up in the Belgian top division in 1974 and 1975. During his time with Antwerp, Van Gaal suffered a broken nose in a friendly against Kortrijk. After four years spent in Belgium, he returned to his homeland and made his Eredivisie debut for Telstar under the guidance of manager, Mircea Petescu, whom he followed to Sparta Rotterdam. He later joined AZ, where he also became assistant coach in 1986. After a short career at AZ, he returned to Ajax to become Leo Beenhakker's assistant. When Beenhakker left in 1991, Van Gaal took over as manager.Management career
Ajax (1991–1997)
Van Gaal was Ajax manager from 1991 until 1997 and had a very successful tenure. Under Van Gaal, Ajax became the Eredivisie champions three times, in 1994, 1995 and 1996. He also led Ajax to the KNVB Cup in 1993 and the Johan Cruyff Shield in 1993, 1994, and 1995. On the European scene, Ajax captured the UEFA Cup in 1992 and the UEFA Champions League in 1995 after beating Milan in the final. The latter win was followed by a 5–1 aggregate win over Real Zaragoza in the 1995 UEFA Super Cup. Late in 1995, Ajax beat Brazilian side Grêmio on penalties to win the Intercontinental Cup. Ajax were also Champions League runners-up in 1996 after losing to Juventus on penalties.Ajax was so successful under Van Gaal's leadership that during the 1990s, the Netherlands national team was dominated by Ajax players such as Patrick Kluivert, Marc Overmars, Dennis Bergkamp, Frank and Ronald de Boer, Edgar Davids, Clarence Seedorf, Winston Bogarde, Michael Reiziger and Edwin van der Sar.
After serving out his contract at Ajax in 1997, Van Gaal received his knighthood in the Order of Orange-Nassau.
Barcelona (1997–2000)
Van Gaal moved to Barcelona in 1997, taking over from Bobby Robson, and helped the team win two La Liga titles and the Copa del Rey once. Despite this success, he clashed with the media and came under criticism. He expressed that it was difficult to implement his football philosophy at Barcelona due to cultural differences, and that he struggled hard as some players were unwilling to follow his lead. His rows with Rivaldo are an example of this: Van Gaal insisted Rivaldo play as a left winger, whereas Rivaldo argued that he wanted to play in the centre, in effect undermining Van Gaal.Van Gaal eventually left the Catalan side on 20 May 2000, days after losing the league title to Deportivo La Coruña, uttering the immortal line: "Amigos de la prensa. Yo me voy. Felicidades." He returned to the Netherlands to manage the Netherlands national team in preparation for the 2002 FIFA World Cup.
Netherlands national team (2000–2002)
Under Van Gaal, the Netherlands started their campaign to qualify for the 2002 World Cup poorly. Placed in Group 2, an injury-hit side could only manage to secure a late 2–2 draw at home to the Republic of Ireland, having been 2–0 down with 20 minutes to go. A 4–0 win over Cyprus was followed by a 2–0 defeat to Portugal.In 2001, the Netherlands beat Andorra, Cyprus and Estonia, but despite leading group leaders Portugal 2–0 with seven minutes left, drew 2–2 and fell three points behind second-place Republic of Ireland, who were unbeaten. When the sides met in Dublin, Van Gaal boasted before the match that his squad was so much more talented, even the Irish fans would want them to qualify. Ireland went down to ten men after 58 minutes but scored nine minutes later and won 1–0. The Netherlands fell seven points behind them with two games left to play, meaning that they failed to qualify for the World Cup for the first time since 1986. Van Gaal stepped down as manager on 31 January 2002 to be replaced by Dick Advocaat. After this, speculation began that Van Gaal would succeed Sir Alex Ferguson at Manchester United once Ferguson claimed he would retire that year. According to Van Gaal, Ferguson decided against retiring and the deal fell through.
Return to Barcelona (2002–2004)
Van Gaal returned to Barcelona for the start of the 2002–03 season on a contract until June 2005, but results were inconsistent. The club won a record-equalling ten successive matches in the Champions League but struggled in La Liga. After four wins, four draws and three defeats from their opening 11 league matches, Barcelona lost three matches in a row, to Real Sociedad, relegation-threatened Rayo Vallecano and Sevilla. Two wins and a draw improved things but after successive defeats to Valencia and Celta Vigo, he left by mutual consent on 28 January 2003 with the club in 12th place, just three points above the relegation zone and 20 points behind leaders Real Sociedad.His transfers, particularly the signings of goalkeeper Robert Enke, midfielder Gaizka Mendieta and playmaker Juan Román Riquelme, all disappointed. Riquelme had been bought to replace Rivaldo, whom Van Gaal had released on a free transfer, despite having a year left on his contract. The two had fallen out during Van Gaal's previous tenure and after Van Gaal returned, Rivaldo said: "Van Gaal is the main cause of my departure. I don't like Van Gaal, and I am sure that he doesn't like me, either." Van Gaal replied that Rivaldo's lack of commitment was the reason he was released, saying that he "was only interested in making more money and playing less. He was chosen as the best player in 1999, but he has not handled himself well since then and has not behaved like a footballer should. He had illusions about Barca and was requesting to take holidays when important Champions League games were approaching. He then hides back home in Brazil. He plays for Brazil like we needed him to at Barcelona, and he has proved this in the World Cup finals, showing he reserved himself for Japan." Rivaldo joined AC Milan and won that season's Champions League. However, due to his poor performances throughout the season, he won the Bidone d'Oro Award in 2003, which is given to the worst Serie A player during a particular season.
Return to Ajax (2004)
In 2004, Van Gaal returned to Ajax as a technical director, but resigned later that year due to an internal conflict with Ronald Koeman.AZ (2005–2009)
In January 2005, it was announced that Van Gaal would replace Co Adriaanse as AZ manager on 1 July 2005. Under Van Gaal, AZ finished second in the Eredivisie in 2005–06 and third in 2006–07. Van Gaal also led AZ to a runners-up finish in the 2006–07 KNVB Cup and lost a 2007–08 Champions League qualification play-off to Ajax 4–2 on aggregate.Van Gaal initially announced he would leave AZ at the end of the 2007–08 season due to disappointing results, with the club finishing 11th in the Eredivisie. When several players of the AZ squad said that they would like him to stay with AZ, however, Van Gaal said he would give the players a chance to prove themselves.
AZ started the 2008–09 season with two losses: 2–1 to NAC Breda and 0–3 to ADO Den Haag, but after that the Alkmaar-based club remained unbeaten until 18 April, topping the table ahead of Twente and Ajax for the entire season, despite being predicted to finish as low as 13th by pundits. AZ had the best defensive record in the Eredivisie and the second-best goalscoring record, behind Ajax, thanks to its offensive duo of league topscorer Mounir El Hamdaoui and Brazilian Ari. They were crowned league champions on 19 April, one day after AZ suffered an unexpected loss at home to Vitesse, which ended a string of 28 unbeaten games. That same day Ajax, which was the only opponent that would have been able to surpass AZ given a win, lost 6–2 to PSV.