José Mourinho

José Mourinho

Mourinho in August 2010
Personal information
Full name	José Mário dos Santos Félix Mourinho
Date of birth	26 January 1963 (age 48)
Place of birth	Setúbal, Portugal
Height	1.74 m (5 ft 9 in)
Playing position	Midfielder
Club information
Current club	Real Madrid (manager)

José Mourinho

José Mário dos Santos Félix Mourinho (Portuguese pronunciation: [ʒuˈzɛ moˈɾiɲu]; born 26 January 1963 in Setúbal) is a Portuguese football manager and the current manager of Real Madrid. He is commonly known as "The Special One". Mourinho is regarded by some players, coaches and critics as the best ever coach in football.

Mourinho started out as a player but he was unable to forge a meaningful career in the game and eventually switched to management. After spells working as an assistant manager and a youth team coach in the early 1990s, he became an interpreter for Sir Bobby Robson. There he worked with him at Sporting Clube de Portugal and Porto in Portugal, before following him to Spanish club Barcelona. He remained in the Catalonian club after Robson's departure and worked with the successor, Louis van Gaal.

He began focusing on coaching and impressed with brief but successful managerial periods at Benfica and União de Leiria. He returned to Porto in 2002, this time as head coach, winning the Primeira Liga, Taça de Portugal, and UEFA Cup in 2003. In 2004 Mourinho guided the team to the top of the league for a second time and won the highest honour in European club football, the UEFA Champions League.

Mourinho moved to Chelsea the following year and won two consecutive Premier League titles in 2005 and 2006. He often courted controversy for his outspokenness, but his victories at Chelsea and Porto established him as one of the world's top football managers.

In mid-2008 he moved to Italy's Serie A, signing a three-year contract with Internazionale. Within three months he had won his first Italian honour, the Supercoppa Italiana, and completed his first season in Italy by winning the Serie A league title. Mourinho followed on from that the next season by winning the first treble in Italian history, the Serie A league title, Coppa Italia, and the UEFA Champions League, thus becoming the third manager in football history to win two UEFA Champions League with two different teams, after Ernst Happel and Ottmar Hitzfeld. Due to these achievements he won the first ever FIFA Ballon d'Or Best Coach Award in 2010.

On 28 May 2010, his appointment as head coach at Real Madrid was confirmed, signing a four-year contract. His first honour with the team was winning the 2011 Copa del Rey Final, the first time Madrid had won the competition since 1993.

Source: Wikipedia

Josep Guardiola

Josep Guardiola

Personal information
Full name	Josep Guardiola i Sala
Date of birth	18 January 1971 (age 40)
Place of birth	Santpedor, Catalonia
Height	1.82 m (6 ft 0 in)
Playing position	Defensive midfielder
Club information
Current club	Barcelona (Manager)

Josep Guardiola

Josep "Pep" Guardiola i Sala (Catalan pronunciation: [ʒuˈzɛb ɡwəɾðiˈɔɫə]; born 18 January 1971 in Santpedor, Barcelona, Spain), is a Spanish football manager and former player. Guardiola played as a defensive midfielder and spent the majority of his playing career with FC Barcelona, whom he currently manages. He was part of Johan Cruyff's dream team that won Barcelona's first European Cup. Guardiola also played for Brescia Calcio and A.S. Roma in Italy; Al-Ahli in Qatar; and for Dorados de Sinaloa in Mexico while attending managing school. While playing in Italy, he served a four-month ban for a positive drug test although he was cleared of wrongdoing twice on appeal in 2009 before the Courts of Justice of the Italian Football Federation (FIGC) and the Federal Anti-Doping Courts of the Italian Olympic Committee (CONI). As an international, he played for Spain and Catalonia.

After retiring as a player, Guardiola became coach of FC Barcelona B. On 8 May 2008, Barcelona president Joan Laporta announced that Guardiola would succeed Frank Rijkaard as the first team manager. He signed his contract on 5 June 2008. In his first season as manager, Barcelona won the treble of La Liga, the Copa del Rey and the Champions League. In doing so, Guardiola became the youngest UEFA Champions League winning manager ever. The following season, Guardiola and Barcelona won the Supercopa de España against Athletic Club Bilbao, the UEFA Super Cup against Shakhtar Donetsk, and the FIFA Club World Cup against Estudiantes, bringing the manager's tally to the maximum of six trophies in six competitions in one year, thus completing the first ever sextuple.

On 8 September 2011, Guardiola was awarded the Catalan Parliament parliament's Gold Medal, its highest honor


Source: Wikipedia

Victor Valdes

Víctor Valdés

Personal information
Full name	Víctor Valdés i Arribas
Date of birth	14 January 1982 (age 29)
Place of birth	L'Hospitalet de Llobregat, Spain
Height	1.83 m (6 ft 0 in)
Playing position	Goalkeeper
Club information
Current club	Barcelona
Number	1

Victor Valdes

Víctor Valdés i Arribas (Spanish pronunciation: [ˈbiktoɾ balˈdes i aˈribas]; born 14 January 1982) is a Spanish football goalkeeper who currently plays for FC Barcelona in the Spanish La Liga.

He is the most successful goalkeeper in Barcelona's history and is widely considered to be one of the best goalkeepers in the world, having won a total of 17 titles including five La Liga titles, three Champions League titles, and one Copa del Rey title. He also has won the Zamora Trophy a record four times. Before joining the full team in 2002–03 season, Valdés played for the youth teams and FC Barcelona B. [1] Currently, he has a contract with Barcelona until 2014

Source: Wikipedia

Gervinho

Gervinho

Gervinho playing for Côte d'Ivoire in a match against Poland
Personal information
Full name	Gervais Yao Kouassi
Date of birth	27 May 1987 (age 24)
Place of birth	Anyama, Côte d'Ivoire
Height	1.79 m (5 ft 10 in)
Playing position	Forward/Winger
Club information
Current club	Arsenal
Number	27

Gervinho

Gervais Yao Kouassi (born 27 May 1987), more commonly known as Gervinho, is an Ivorian footballer who plays as a forward or as a winger for English Premier League club Arsenal.


Source: Wikipedia

Nicolas Anelka

Nicolas Anelka

Anelka playing for Chelsea F.C.
Personal information
Full name	Abdul-Salam Bilal (Nicolas Sébastien Anelka)
Date of birth	14 March 1979 (age 32)
Place of birth	Versailles, France
Height	1.85 m (6 ft 1 in)
Playing position	Striker / Winger
Club information
Current club	Chelsea
Number	39

Nicolas Anelka

Abdul-Salam Bilal (born Nicolas Sebastien Anelka French pronunciation: [nikɔla anɛlka];) on 14 March 1979)[6] is a French international footballer, who plays as a striker for English Premier League club Chelsea. Anelka was also a regular starter for the French national team. Former Chelsea manager Carlo Ancelotti has described him as a quick player with good aerial ability, technique, shooting, and movement off the ball.

Anelka began his career at Paris Saint-Germain, but soon moved to Arsenal. He became a first team regular and won the PFA Young Player of the Year Award the following season. Real Madrid signed him for £22.3 million in 1999, a record fee at the time, but he did not settle in well and returned to Paris Saint-Germain in a £20 million deal. Despite regular first team football in Paris, Anelka set his eyes upon the Premier League once more; he went on loan to Liverpool in January 2002 but joined Manchester City for £13 million at the start of the 2002–03 season.

After three seasons in Manchester, he moved to Fenerbahçe for two seasons before returning to England to join Bolton Wanderers – in deals worth £7 million and £8 million, respectively. He transferred to Chelsea from Bolton for a reported £15 million in January 2008. During his transfers over the years, he has built an aggregate transfer cost of just under £90 million. He is one of only three players to have won the Premier League with two different clubs.[citation needed]

Anelka has played many times at international level and won his first international honours with France at Euro 2000, and won the Confederations Cup the following year. His failure to settle at club level limited his international appearances, but he returned to the national team for the Euro 2008 competition.

On 19 June 2010, Anelka was excluded by the French Football Federation from the 2010 World Cup in South Africa for "comments directed against the national coach, Raymond Domenech, unacceptable to the FFF, French football, and the principles they uphold." Two months later, having failed to turn up to his disciplinary hearing, he was banned for France's next eighteen games by the FFF, effectively ending his international career.


Source: Wikipedia

Marek Hamsik

Marek Hamšík

Personal information
Date of birth	27 July 1987 (age 24)
Place of birth	Banská Bystrica, Czechoslovakia
Height	1.83 m (6 ft 0 in)
Playing position	Attacking Midfielder
Club information
Current club	Napoli
Number	17

Marek Hamsik

Marek Hamšík (born 27 July 1987) is a Slovak football midfielder who currently plays for Serie A club S.S.C. Napoli and captains the Slovakia national team.


Source: Wikipedia

César Sánchez

César Sánchez

Personal information
Full name	César Sánchez Domínguez
Date of birth	2 September 1971 (age 40)
Place of birth	Cáceres, Spain
Height	1.85 m (6 ft 1 in)
Playing position	Goalkeeper

César Sánchez
César Sánchez Domínguez (Spanish pronunciation: [ˈθesar ˈsantʃeθ]; born 2 September 1971), known as César or Sánchez, is a Spanish footballer who plays for Villarreal CF as a goalkeeper.


Source: Wikipedia