From Football Manager to director in the French league: the incredible story of the coach who embittered the PSG of Messi, Neymar and Mbappé

Knowing your limits is one of the keys to success in any area of ​​life. That is, figuring out what you’re good at, what you’re not, and focus on doing everything you can to enhance those virtues and hide your flaws. William Still clearly understood this.

​The coach of Reims Stadium, that this Sunday is linked to the hour before the powerful paris saint germain Of Messi, Neymar and Mbappe, He is passionate about football, but there was a moment when he realized he wasn’t going to make it as a professional footballer. I didn’t have the conditions. “I had come a long way before I realized I was never going to be successful as a player”he said in an interview with The voice of the coaches.

He dreamed of feeling the adrenaline of a full pitch, so he took the other possible path to make it happen: being a technical director. He already was when I was playing football coach, the classic video game that captivated millions of football fans around the world, and now they wanted to bring it to reality.

He is English, his parents are English and he attended university in England, but was born and raised in Belgium. His first experience as a DT was at Preston North End Academy and he fell in love with it. “It was great. I had trained before, with my brother in Belgium, but nothing at this level. ‘These guys are really good!’ I thought. After that, I realized that training was what I wanted to do.”details.

Back in Belgium, he went looking for an opportunity. He hadn’t been a footballer or had a coaching career, so he had to pave his own way. As expected, he got a lot of ‘No’s. One after another until the end Yannick Ferreraa young Belgian coach who managed second division Sint-Truiden, gave him a chance.

“Our first league rival plays tomorrow. Go watch them, record it, edit it and give me your opinion within two days”, were Yannick’s first words. There he found what he was looking for, being able to apply the concepts that the Football manager. The hours and hours in front of the family computer screen, playing games with his brother, were finally paying off.

He didn’t want to miss the opportunity and made an exhaustive analysis of his rival, much more detailed than the manager expected. He made a good impression and inadvertently became the team’s video analyst. Though he wasn’t paid, he was starting to make his dream come true.

“At first I was doing video analysis, but then I spent more and more time on the pitch. Without anything official being said, I ended up becoming something of his aide. First he organized set pieces, then a few rondos, suddenly he was practicing his passing. I was participating more and more in training sessions,” he said The voice of the coaches.

the first big leap

Now with a few more scrolls, he becomes an assistant at Lierse, still in the second division, and there he receives his first coaching proposal. Before the main DT was fired, the club owner chose him.

Although Still was not convinced, largely due to the fear that taking on such responsibility generated in him, he took the position at the age of 24. “I don’t care about others. I like you. You have many good ideas and you are already doing it. You will”they said to convince him. And they convinced him.

“It was crazy. I went from being a nobody to someone known, at least locally. All of a sudden I was stopped by companies and I was on the news and on TV”he remembers, though he recognizes it then “I kept trying things in the football coach”.

Today the popular Monday newspaper shows its face. It is that the 30-year-old Rossoneri manages Reims which only a few hours ago embittered the powerful Psg of Messi, Neymar and Mbappé. He doesn’t have much time to sit and play anymore, but he appreciates the influence this video game has had on him.

“I never thought that he football coach It could have affected my career, but now that I think about it, it clearly has. I became obsessed with the game as a kid and it kindled the fire in me that I have now as a coach,” he points out.

He didn’t let the train pass

If this story is about exploiting opportunities, his journey in Reims follows the same premise. He started out as an assistant Oscar Garcia Junyent, after conducting Beerschot in the Belgian Primera, and before the Spanish DT was sacked, they called him. A new vocation.

He started with a six-match offer, the last one before the World Cup in Qatar, but his good results (two wins and four draws) kept him in command. “Like the little bug that bites you football coachhe wanted to get another chance as head coach. But like every stage of my career, I didn’t plan for it. At no time did I think I would be the coach of the Stade de Reims. And less at that time”remember that moment.

Already installed in the elite and enjoying his time in France, he now has a clear goal: “The child in me, the one who conquered everything in the football coachHe tells me to hold on to the dream of managing West Ham, my club.”