How To Do Well At A World Cup

Remember South Korea at the 2002 World Cup Finals? Did well, didn't they? Home advantage; some lucky decisions: yup, these things played their part. But, to my mind, the reason for South Korea's success was clever management on the part of then boss Guus Hiddink.

Realising that the South Koreans were a) awful and b) not going to play a competitive match ahead of the 2002 World Cup, Hiddink organised friendlies against the world's best, including both France and England. Thus, he managed to hone a competitive spirit and turn them into a half decent team.

The reason I bring this up now is because it looks like Mexico boss Javier Aguirre is trying to do the same thing. Mexico have already played 5 friendlies this month and they have a further three still to play ahead of the 2010 World Cup Finals.

They have already played England and have Holland, Gambia and Italy still to play. Indeed, the only reason they are playing Gambia is that their original opponents, Portugal, pulled out.

It seems to me that Aguirre is taking the World Cup very, very seriously and is attempting to turn Mexico into a team that is very comfortable playing together, as opposed to a collection of internationals with no more than a week or two training together before the tournament.

It's going to be interesting to see if he can pull it off, but I for one think Mexico might just be a surprise package at the 2010 World Cup Finals.

Who Next For The Ivory Coast

Not content with sacking a manager who lost only one match in 24, the Ivory Coast Football Federation seems to be making a bit of a meal of appointing a successor.

Yesterday, it appeared that leading candidate Guus Hiddink had been named as manager for the 2010 World Cup campaign, but today it appears that this isn't actually the case. And, in fact, there is quite a way to go in negotiations.

You would have thought that a nation that has gone through no less than no less than six coaches in under four years would be old hands at this kind of thing, wouldn't you?

That last stat is very telling, however. Well all know that Ivory Coast have some great players - Yaya Toure, Didier Drogba and others - but they always fall short. And they always will until the Ivorian FA give a coach a proper chance to build a team.

Hiddink Turns Up At Turkey

Regular readers of this blog know that I'm a big fan of Guus Hiddink. Mainly, because I've always backed his teams with cold hard cash and until Russia's failure to qualify for World Cup 2010, he has never let me down.

Indeed, I decided against starting at Euro 2008 blog because I was so confident that England weren't going to qualify because they were in the same group as Hiddink's Russia and the - at the time - superior Croatia. That blog is here.

Anyway, it looks like the rumours suggesting Hiddink would be managing Nigeria at the World Cup Finals were wrong, as the Dutchman has taken over the role of national team coach of Turkey.

Turkey, like Russia, failed to qualify for the World Cup Finals, but were impressive at Euro 2008, so the raw materials are definitely there.

A few pundits have questioned why Hiddink would want to take over Turkey but to me, it's a good move. Their Euro 2012 qualifying group includes Germany, Austria, Belgium, Kazakhstan and Azerbaijan (aren't some of those countries in Asia?) and you would back Hiddink to get a well organised Turkey to get through that Group. In fact, that's exactly what I'm going to do.

Hiddink Could Make The World Cup After All

Let's face it, Russia's failure to make the World Cup 2010 - mainly, I feel, due to complacency on the part of the players - was a surprise. Most of all to me.

I've always backed sides managed by Guus Hiddink to do well and, frankly, he's made me a lot of money down the years by always coming through when I've bet on his teams.

His management of South Korea ahead of the 2002 World Cup Finals was a masterclass for any international manager. What he did was take a worse than mediocre side and turn them into a competitive team.

Because South Korea had no competitive games before the 2002 Finals, Hiddink lined up a succession of friendly matches over a period of eighteen months against teams from around the world.

After drubbings by France and the Czech Republic among others, by the time the 2002 World Cup Finals rolled around, they were hammering Scotland and drawing with England.

And, of course, he steered Australia to the second round in 2006 and got Russia through to the Euro 2008 finals at the expense of England.

Having left his post as Russia manager, Hiddink has already, very wisely, turned down an approach from North Korea to manage them at South Africa 2010. But, it appears the Dutchman may be interested in taking over coaching duties with Nigeria.

Interestingly, Nigeria's World Cup group includes his old side South Korea, but - if he takes the job - you would definitely back Hiddink to get Nigeria through to the second round and possibly the quarter finals.