Scott Parker is relishing the “huge challenge” of taking over at Belgian champions Club Brugge midway through a Champions League adventure.
The 42-year-old former Fulham and Bournemouth manager became the latest English coach to chance his arm overseas after being unveiled on Monday at the club’s Belfius Basecamp training ground.
Parker was sacked by the Cherries in August after a 9-0 drubbing at Liverpool and reports of rows with the board over funds for players. But Parker, who starred as a player with Chelsea, Newcastle, Spurs and West Ham, is confident he can join a small group of English coaches to be successful overseas.
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Brugge are 18-times national champions in Belgium, including the last three seasons – but currently stand fourth and 12 points behind leaders Genk.
But Parker, whose new charges face Benfica in the last 16 of the Champions League next month, denied he was hard to work with after the sudden exit at Bournemouth.
He said: “I am not difficult to work with. I want to win and be successful, and I understand how certain things can be perceived in certain moments after games with emotion high. It is a massive honour to be at a club in the Champions League – but that wasn’t the driver.
“First and foremost I am very excited and delighted to be here at the football club – me and my staff. And the most important thing for my next job was to be aligned with those at the top.
“I am here for the long term. This is the right place for me to keep improving. And this is a huge challenge for me – an English coach, stepping away from where I have been all my life.
“It is a new environment and new culture, and that is something I can’t wait to be around. The main reason for coming here was after in-depth conversations with those running things is that it aligns with how I feel clubs should be run.
“There is a huge history here, and the way it has been run and the success they have had make it a great fit for me. I am a young and passionate coach, and I want to excel in a great environment.
“There is a young squad with individual players that need developing, to get them to their potential. And that is something I have done pretty well.
“I am an intense coach. The motto outside this training ground ‘No sweat, no glory’ is what I am all about – as a player and a manager. The players and I will be one million percent committed.
“And technically I like the ball, I want my team to dominate games. Hopefully over time you will see a real style emerge.
“I had brilliant times at both Fulham and Bournemouth, and enjoyed two promotions to the Premier League in three full seasons as a coach. They were both very good experiences.
“It has been pretty hectic and busy these past few days – full-on. But the club’s owners have been so professional in the way they sold this to me. Since being here, it is exactly what they said.”
And Parker admitted that former Fulham defender Denis Odoi had been a useful source of information about Club Brugge. He added: “I had contact with Denis once I signed, and that was all very positive. He spoke very highly about the squad and the training ground. I look forward to meeting him again tomorrow [Tue], he is a great professional and player. He might be able to give me a hand with certain things.”
Some combination of the salaries on offer in the UK in the Premier League era, plus a widespread reluctance in football circles to learn languages and take themselves out of their cultural comfort zone to embrace a very different life mean the number of English coaches chancing their arm overseas is less than it might have been – and certainly less than is the case in reverse.
But of course over time there have been examples, and some have been very successful. Title-winners abroad include the late Sir Bobby Robson at PSV Eindhoven and Porto; Terry Venables at Barcelona; ‘Schteve’ McClaren at FC Twente; and Roy Hodgson at Halmstads and Malmo in Sweden, plus Copenhagen in Denmark.
Current Chelsea and former Brighton boss Graham Potter was a big hit at Ostersunds in Sweden, honing his holistic coaching style that proved such a success at the Amex.
Further back Malcolm Allison won the Portuguese league with Sporting, while Vic Buckingham won the Dutch league with Ajax to become one of the ‘founding fathers’ of what would become known globally as ‘total football’. And the pioneering Lancastrian Jimmy Hogan won five league titles with MTK Budapest in Hungary from 1917 to 1921.
Then were the less successful examples. Gary Neville at Valencia springs to mind, where with brother Phil as assistant the successful TV pundit bombed badly, winning just three La Liga games from 16. He was swiftly sacked. Howard Kendall, the legendary Everton manager, did far less well at Athletic Bilbao despite once seeing them finish fourth, and worse with Greek sides Xanthi and Ethnikos Piraeus.
Alan Pardew’s spell at Dutch side Den Haag was ruined by Covid, and a subsequent stint at Bulgaria’s CSKA Sofia was short and unmemorable. He is now at Greek side Aris Thessaloniki. Steve Coppell’s spells with three sides in India did not yield much success. And former Hull boss Phil Brown was sacked by Indian side Pune City – which became Hyderabad - after a run of one win in 12 games.
And spare a thought for nomadic coach Stephen Constantine. The 60-year-old Londoner has had stints working at Millwall and Bournemouth. But more exotically, his past employers include the national teams of Nepal, India, Malawi, Sudan and Rwanda – plus club sides in Cyprus, Greece and India.
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