Zdeněk Zeman
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http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052702303830204577444361592390248.html?KEYWORDS=zemanThe Return of Soccer's Jedi
Zeman Earns Another Shot at the Big Time; Inside the Mind of a Maverick
By GABRIELE MARCOTTI
Zdenek Zeman, a soccer maverick, is expected to be hired as Roma's manager as soon as this week.
A little over two years ago, Zdenek Zeman sat at an outdoor table at a bar in a residential Rome neighborhood and did something he's probably done tens of millions of times in his life. He took a long, hard drag of his cigarette and stared right through the person to whom he was talking.
"Do you enjoy watching soccer?" he asked in a low monotone.
Another drag, followed by the kind of pause that made you think he was done talking. But then he started again.
"I rarely do anymore," he said. "I still watch because I can't help it. I'm addicted... but it's not the same." Another drag. "It's not my world anymore."
Very soon—probably this week, according to both Zeman and club sources—Zeman will be back coaching in the big time at Roma. Eleven seasons will have passed since the last time he was at a major club in a major league. They were 11 years in which soccer fans were denied the sight of one of the most original, innovative and maverick minds in the history of the game breaking taboos, defying convention and, above all, entertaining.
"We did say we wanted to play an attractive style. Well, [Zeman] fits that, right?" said Franco Baldini, Roma's general director.
He certainly does. Zeman's philosophy is predicated on a high-energy 4-3-3 system that's unlike anything you're bound to see today, mainly because it is played at a breakneck pace with wave after wave of attackers streaming forward.
Zeman illustrated his vision a few years ago: "Whenever we attack, all three forwards have to be in the penalty area while two of the three midfielders come forward as well. That way the opponent is pinned back. Then you put the ball in the box, and because you have more men, you have more chances of scoring. It's not rocket science. It's simple math."
Of course, put like that, it's simple to the point of suicidal. But the simplicity hides a complexity based on two things: fitness and movement. Zeman's teams play at a higher pace than their opponents, mainly because they train harder and longer. And they play with a stunning synchronicity of movement. Players don't pass to teammates; they pass to where they know their teammates will be, because they're always on the move.
Zeman's critics say he wears players out, an accusation he disputes. "My training sessions may be long, repetitive and intense, but they're fun," he said. "And when you're having fun, you don't get tired. Have you ever seen little kids running around all day long? Do they get tired?"
Everything about Zeman is unconventional. He's both bohemian and Bohemian. Born in Prague in 1947, he moved to Italy—where his uncle, Cestmir Vycpalek, was a soccer coach—shortly after Russian tanks rolled in back in 1968. Armed with a degree in sports medicine and little else—he had given up playing organized soccer at the age of 16, though he was a competitive handball player—he began coaching amateur teams in dusty Sicilian backwaters.
Thus began an incredible ascent through Italian soccer's food chain that saw him reach Serie A in 1991. He stuck around in the top flight for seven seasons, first at Foggia, then at Lazio and Roma, winning plaudits for his exciting run-and-gun style. In the traditionally conservative world of Italian soccer, he also annoyed the fundamentalists for being a little too iconoclastic. This applied both to his playing philosophy and to some of his public statements, like when he suggested some clubs misused prescription drugs to gain an edge on the pitch, or when he talked about the game's "old-boy network" of favors and back-scratching.
By the turn of the millennium, Zeman had developed a reputation as someone who was more trouble than he was worth: a bright coach, but one who was so fixated with certain ideas that he took unnecessary risks. He was also seen as a loose cannon whose frequent barbs were no less dangerous because they were delivered in his trademark deliberate, slow staccato.
Zeman seemingly became persona non grata in the game's higher echelons. He bounced around smaller clubs with even smaller budgets, never staying more than a season. Last summer, he took over Pescara in Italy's second tier, and the magic returned. The club won Serie B and was promoted back to the big time. And Zeman was offered the Roma gig. All of a sudden, it's the mid-1990s again.
Zeman, who turned 65 last month, admits this is probably his "last chance at a top club." Roma, of course, is also rolling the dice. Since a U.S.-based consortium acquired a controlling share in the club in April 2011, the emphasis has been on entertainment and long-term growth. The new owners appointed Luis Enrique, a former Barcelona reserve-team coach, in the hope of replicating its model. It only worked to a point, and he resigned at the end of the season, citing stress and burnout.
Zeman is an equally bold move. The fear is that this will end up like Zeman-coached teams of the past: pretty soccer, plenty of entertainment and a great big goose egg when it comes to results.
"But playing for results is not the same as playing soccer—my teams play soccer," he said in 2009. "The way some so-called winning teams play today, it's all about the players. The managers just focus on not conceding and leave everything up to the players. Guys like [Fabio] Capello and [Jose] Mourinho are hailed as geniuses because they win. Well, they win because they have the best players, not because of what they do. I could put my dead grandfather in charge of their teams and they would still win."
Whatever happens—as always when Zeman is involved—it won't be dull.
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snad se brzo uzdraví. Měl by to hulení omezit tak na krabičku denně. A Walter taky 
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už je to tady 
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