Bertalan Bicskei, the former Malaysian National Team Coach once remarked that the potential for football in the Far East is excellent. He took up the challenge to try to teach the Malaysian Tigers to play football with Hungarian charm and European manners, but was shown the exit in true Malaysian style, something that Sathia is about to face.
Bicskei has had many successes with different soccer clubs and national teams from Europe, Asia and Africa. He started his successful coaching career with a gold medal in the European Championship in Moscow 1984, with the Hungarian U-18 National Team. He continued his success, with FC Honved, Budapest, were Bicskei won the Hungarian national league twice – 1988 and 1989, and the Cup in 1989. He moved to South Korea in 1991 where he became head coach of FC Daewoo Royals, Korean Champions and Cup winners. This year he was named “the coach of the year” in South Korea, being one of the first foreign coaches in South Korean to win this title. Bicskei also coached the Hungarian National team in 1989-1990 and again from 1998 to 2002. In his successful career Bicskei has coached many teams from around the world, such as FC Lucerne (Switzerland), Al – Raed SC (Saudi – Arabia), FC Senyang Ginde (China) and FC Al-Masry (Egypt).
Below is an article from The News International Pakistan detailing the Pakistan Football Federation plans to hire our former coach. Perhaps Fat Boy can now complete his mission of inviting teams with "tan" in the end for this year's Merdeka Tournament...Afghanistan, Khazakstan, Uzbekistan, Pakistan...
Wednesday, January 21, 2009
By Alam Zeb Safi
KARACHI: The football governing body in the country (PFF) is desperately looking to conclude the matter of hiring a foreign coach before the national footballers assemble in Lahore in the first week of February to initiate preparatory campaign for the Prime Minister Invitation Cup to be staged in Nepal from March 4 to 15.“We desperately need a foreign coach before the camp begins in Lahore. We will try to enter into a deal with either the Hungarian or German coach which we have already shortlisted for the purpose till the first week of February so that he could take up the responsibility of preparing the team for the trip to Nepal,” the secretary of the PFF Col Ahmad Yar Lodhi told ‘The News’ on Monday.He said that that the Hungarian Bertalan Bicskei will be the first to be invited from January 26 to 31 for proper negotiation over the deal. If the talks with him don’t materialise then the second option will be Germany’s Toney Hey whose demands are higher than the Hungarian.Lodhi said that 64-year old Hungarian Bertalan Bicskei has been a coach of Malaysian national team while Toney Hey has served as Liberia’s coach. He made it clear that the PFF will enter into a deal with any one of them for three years. He said that the PFF will take the step only when it will receive the Rs 20 millions special grant from the federal government for the objective.He also said that the basic purpose behind the idea to have a foreign coach for at least three years is not only to prepare a better lot but also to make a pool of well-trained domestic coaches who could coach the national teams in the future.Since Bahrain’s Salman Ahmad Sharida left the scene after the 15th Asian Games in Doha, in December 2006, the burden of steering the national teams towards achieving glory fell on home-grown coaches.
