Marcel Koller
Koller managing Austria in 2014
Personal information
Full name Marcel Martin Koller
Date of birth (1960-11-11) 11 November 1960
Place of birth Zürich, Switzerland
Height 1.73 m (5 ft 8 in)
Position(s) Midfielder
Team information
Current team
 Al Ahly (manager)
Youth career
1970–1972 FC Schwamendingen
1972–1978 Grasshoppers
Senior career*
Years Team Apps (Gls)
1978–1997 Grasshoppers 428 (59)
International career
1982–1996 Switzerland 56 (3)
Managerial career
1997–1998 FC Wil
1999–2002 St. Gallen
2002–2003 Grasshoppers
2003–2004 1. FC Köln
2005–2009 VfL Bochum
2011–2017 Austria
2018–2020 Basel
2022– Al Ahly
*Club domestic league appearances and goals

Marcel Martin Koller (born 11 November 1960) is a Swiss professional football manager and former player who is the current head coach of Al Ahly in the Egyptian Premier League.

Playing career

Born in Zürich, Koller played his entire career for Swiss club Grasshoppers Zürich. In these 24 years he won seven Swiss championships and five Swiss cups. Koller was capped 56 times for the Swiss national team, scoring 3 goals. He was part of the Swiss squad at Euro 1996.

Managerial career

Switzerland

Koller's career as coach started at the Swiss club FC Wil in the 1997–98 season. He led his club to a promotion place in the Swiss Challenge League. In January 1999 he went to FC St. Gallen in the Swiss Super League. One year later the club won its first championship for almost 100 years. Also on European level FC St. Gallen would celebrate successes: in the UEFA Cup the Swiss side would eliminate English top club FC Chelsea. Koller was voted Swiss manager of the year 2000.

On 9 January 2002, he went to his old love, Grasshoppers Zürich. Koller won his second championship as a coach in the 2003 Season. After failing to qualify for the Champions League (against AEK 1–0/1–3) and a losing streak in the league he resigned on 3 October 2003.[1]

1. FC Köln

The next step in his career was a move to German Bundesliga. Koller's first station in Germany was 1. FC Köln.[2] However, this spell was not a very successful and took only seven months. Koller took the club in a desperate position and could not improve the results. In his term the club only won four matches and relegated eventually to 2. Bundesliga. During this period he gave young talents the opportunity to debut on the highest level. The most prominent example is German international Lukas Podolski. 1. FC Köln ended at last position. Koller was sacked after the season ended.[3]

VfL Bochum

From 23 May 2005 on, Koller was the coach of German side VfL Bochum.[4] The club was relegated into the Second Bundesliga the season before and its coach Peter Neururer was sacked as a result. Koller got the challenge to lead the club directly back to the highest level. Already five matches before the end of the season VfL Bochum was sure of its return to the Bundesliga.

The goal of season 2006–07 was to stay in the Bundesliga. VfL Bochum did not start very well and many supporters demanded the dismissal of the coach. But the board kept faith in the coach and Koller's contract was even extended in that difficult period. VfL Bochum bought a few new players in the winter break and started a winning streak. Highlights were two memorable home victories against arch rivals Borussia Dortmund (2–0) and FC Schalke 04. (2–1). Bochum even had a winning streak of four away victories in a row at the end of the season, a new club record. Already two rounds for the end of the season VfL Bochum was sure of survival in the Bundesliga. Eventually the club finished at the 8th place, the third best season for Bochum ever.

The VfL Bochum lost three important players in the summer break 2007 so that most observers were rather skeptical about the club in the coming season. But the club played a solid season and ended, without too much relegation troubles, in the midfield. However, at the beginning of the season 2008–09 Koller defined 45 points as target. Surprisingly Bochum did not have to sell key players and could even afford some relatively spectacular transfers. With the return of former key players Paul Freier and Vahid Hashemian, and the purchase of the talents Daniel Fernandes and Austrian international Christian Fuchs Koller called his team the best team he had at Bochum ever. Nevertheless, the club came into relegation troubles and could save itself rather late in the season. At the end Bochum finished 14th in that season. Again many supporters asked during the season for the dismissal of the coach. Especially the release of crowd pleaser Tomasz Zdebel in the winter break caused many frictions with the fans.

Due to the relatively poor results in the season before, Koller started under great pressure in the 2009–10 season. With only four points out of the first six matches VfL Bochum started again rather disappointing and the public pressure grew continuously. After a 2–3 home defeat by FSV Mainz more than two thousand supporters gathered at the stadium to demand his dismissal. As a reaction one day later, at 20 September 2009 Koller was sacked as head coach of VfL Bochum.[5]

Austria national team

On 4 October 2011, Koller was appointed as the new manager of the Austria national team.[6] Koller officially started on 1 November 2011.[7] He was in charge of Austria when it reached the final phase of a European championship for the first time by the qualifying groups (the only previous participation at a final phase being in 2008 as co-hosts). In 2016 the national team reached its highest position ever (10th) in the FIFA World Rankings.

FC Basel

From August 2018 to August 2020, Koller was the head coach of FC Basel, where he won the 2018–19 Swiss Cup.[8]

Al Ahly

On 9 September 2022, Koller signed a two-year contract with Egyptian club Al Ahly.[9] On 28 October 2022, he won his first title with Al Ahly after beating Zamalek SC 2–0 in the 2021–22 Egyptian Super Cup at Hazza bin Zayed Stadium in Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates.[10] On 10 April 2023, he won his second title after beating Pyramids FC 2–1 in the 2021–22 Egypt Cup final.[11] On 5 May 2023, he won his third title after beating Pyramids FC 1-0 in the 2022–23 Egyptian Super Cup after that he won the African Champions League on 11 June 2023 against Wydad AC in Casablanca after he won the first leg match 2-1 in Cairo and the second leg match ended with draw 1-1 to give Al Ahly their 11th champions league (world record) and then on 15 July 2023 he won the 2022–23 Egyptian Premier League with only one loss.

Managerial record

As of match updated 28 December 2023
Team From To Record
G W D L GF GA GD Win %
FC Wil 1 July 1997[12] 30 June 1998[12] 41 15 16 10 63 49 +14 036.59
St. Gallen 1 January 1999[13] 8 January 2002[13] 129 59 34 36 230 170 +60 045.74
Grasshoppers 9 January 2002[14] 2 October 2003[14] 75 40 18 17 163 102 +61 053.33
1. FC Köln 2 November 2003[2] 16 June 2004[3] 24 4 5 15 24 40 −16 016.67
VfL Bochum 23 May 2005[4] 20 September 2009[5] 152 55 39 58 214 215 −1 036.18
Austria 1 November 2011[7] 31 December 2017 54 25 13 16 81 58 +23 046.30
Basel 2 August 2018 31 August 2020 101 61 19 21 214 114 +100 060.40
Al Ahly 9 September 2022 Present 82 55 19 8 152 52 +100 067.07
Total 658 314 163 181 1,141 800 +341 047.72

Honours

Player

Grasshoppers

Manager

St Gallen

Grasshoppers

Vfl Bochum

Basel

Al Ahly

References

  1. ↑ "Marcel Koller neuer Trainer in Bochum". Handelsblatt (in German). 23 May 2005. Retrieved 17 February 2019.
  2. 1 2 "Funkel Nachfolger: 1.FC Köln verpflichtet Marcel Koller". Der Spiegel. Retrieved 3 November 2003.
  3. 1 2 "Stevens beerbt Koller". kicker (in German). 14 June 2004. Retrieved 25 March 2013.
  4. 1 2 "Marcel Koller übernimmt Bochum". kicker (in German). 23 May 2005. Retrieved 25 March 2013.
  5. 1 2 "Schlechter Saisonstart: Bochum feuert Trainer Koller". Der Spiegel. Retrieved 20 September 2009.
  6. ↑ "Offiziell: Koller ist neuer ÖFB-Coach". kicker (in German). 4 October 2011. Retrieved 26 March 2013.
  7. 1 2 "Karriere (Trainer)" (in German). Fussballdaten.de. Retrieved 26 March 2013.
  8. ↑ "Gemeinsame Entscheidung: Coach Koller verlässt den FC Basel". t-online.de (in German). 19 August 2020.
  9. ↑ Ahmed El-Ramady (10 September 2022). "Al Ahly is the greatest club in Africa, says new head coach Marcel Koller". KingFut.
  10. ↑ Seif Soliman (28 October 2022). "VIDEO: Al Ahly clinch 2022 Egypt Super Cup over Zamalek". KingFut.
  11. ↑ Soliman, Seif (10 April 2023). "VIDEO: Al Ahly crowned Egypt Cup champions after extra-time win over Pyramids". KingFut. Retrieved 29 April 2023.
  12. 1 2 "FC Wil 1900 .:. Coaches from A-Z". World Football. Retrieved 26 March 2013.
  13. 1 2 "FC St. Gallen .:. Coaches from A-Z". World Football. Retrieved 26 March 2013.
  14. 1 2 "Grasshoppers Zürich .:. Coaches from A-Z". World Football. Retrieved 26 March 2013.
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