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By Tony Attwood
Patrick Vieira, who as of course you know, played 279 games for Arsenal, has been appointed as head coach of Senegal (where he was born), and it seems only appropriate that we should add our congratulations to one of our very greatest players – and of course a winner of the World Cup in 1998. The country he has joined has just lost its place in the current World Cup so it seems an appropriate moment for them to have a change, although I must admit my knowledge of Senegalese footballing affairs is modest in the extreme. If you’d like to fill in more details, please leave a comment.
What I do know is that Senegal did make it to the last 32 of the world cup but then lost to Belgium, and then promptly sacked their manager (in the way that national associations do). That manager had been with the country since 2024 seemed to have a poor sense of timing has having had the country knocked out of the world cup as ked for a pay rise. (In my experience of work, pay rises tend to follow success rather than failure – but maybe international football is different).
In their most recent world cup matches Senegal have lost to France and Norway but beat Iraq.
But Patrick himself has experience of moving around in the football world, having won the league with Arsenal and then moved on to Juventus and Manchester City before joining New York City as a coach and then Nice as a manager. After that he managed Crystal Palace but was sacked in March 2023 after a 12-match run without a win. After that he worked for a short period with Strasbourg and then with Genoa in Italy.
In his playing career he played 107 times for France and won the World Cup in 1998 as well as the Euros two years later.
Under Thiaw, Senegal won the Africa Cup of Nations final in January before then having their title taken away from them because they walked off the pitch during the final match. We covered some of the details of one of Senegal’s games on this site, if you are interested in the details. Senegal have appealed that decision, with a hearing to take place behind closed doors at the court of arbitration for sport in Lausanne, Switzerland on 8 October.
Patrick joined Arsenal from AC Milan where he had hardly made an appearance and played for Arsenal for nine years, clocking up 279 games and scoring 29 goals. After that he moved to Juventus (31 games), Inter Milan (67 games) and Manchester City (28 games). Overall in top class football he played 456 games and scored 45 goals.
Senegal have had what might be called a fairly adventurous time of late having won the Africa Cup of Nations but then having their title removed because they had left the pitch during the final match against Morocco. The appeal against the removal of their title has yet to be heard, although it is reported that when the hearing is finally held, it will be held in secret, although I can’t find an explanation as to why that is deemed to be necessary. If you know please do write in: maybe there is a threat of a committee room invasion. The only detail I’ve got so far is that it will be held in Lausanne on 8 October.
So here we have the tale of a great footballer trying to find his way after his playing career is over, and I must say the issue of what great footballers do after their careers as players ends is a most fascinating one, and obviously going into football management is a move that attracts a lot of players. I’ve never seen a fulsome analysis of the issue, but it does seem to me that there is often little link between the ability of a man on the pitch as a player and his ability as a manager. The game might be the same but the skills in terms of seeing how to play it, and then getting one’s players to play the game that way seem to be completely different.
The most obvious example for an Arsenal supporter is Arsene Wenger who as far as I know played 56 games for Mulhouse and 11 games for RC Strasbourg, as well as having spells at a couple of other clubs without getting games as a first team player. But it would take 100 articles to describe how he transformed football in every way and indeed ultimately created the Invincibles. In fact come to think of it, there probably are 100 such articles on this site.
