Cooper Hector, Argentine footballer and coach: biography, sports career

Cooper Hector is an Argentine coach and former football player who currently coaches the Egyptian national football team. He was already 61 years old, but so far the athlete does not think about how to finish his coaching career. When Cooper Hector left the field, he played in the position of the central defender.

Career football player

Cooper Hector was not considered a star of the first magnitude, when he was a player. He was born on November 16, 1955 in the Argentine city of Chabas. To build a football career, soon moved closer to the capital. There he joined the club "Ferrocaril Oeste", with which almost all of his playing career will be connected.

However, as already mentioned earlier, Cooper was not a star player or a great talent, so he could debut in the club only at the age of 21, that is, in 1976. After only five matches for his native club, the athlete moved to Independiente Rivadavia, but did not stay there for long. For the season he went on the field six times, noted two goals and in 1978 returned to "Ferrocaril" to continue his career and become a legend of the club.

For ten years, the player played for "Ferrocaril Oeste", going on the field 424 times and scoring 24 years. Cooper Hector became the real star of the club, but it's worth remembering that FC was extremely small and usually played in the second division. And only in 1988, when he was already 33 years old, Cooper said goodbye to his native club and signed a four-year contract with "Hurricane".

Despite his honorable age, the Argentinian football player was a regular player of the starting lineup and over the course of four years he had 132 matches, marking 8 goals. And when his contract came to an end, in 1992 he announced that he was completing his football career.

As for the national team of Argentina, in it, he almost never appeared. Argentine footballer was summoned to the national team only three times in 1984, in the heyday of the game for "Ferrocaril", but afterwards he did not get into Argentina's bid.

Please note that in 1992, football life for Cooper did not end, as he decided to continue his career as a coach. Having passed the necessary training, the athlete received a coaching license. In the summer of 1993 he took up the post of head coach in "Urakan", that is, in the club where he spent the last four years of his career as a player.

The beginning of the way

Hector Cooper is a coach, who immediately was able to show an impressive result. In the "Hurricane" he spent only two seasons, but in the first he practically led the club to the championship. "Huracan" lost to "Independiente" just one point and finished the race in second place. The next season was not so successful and spoiled the statistics for the beginning coach, who left the club in the summer of 1995 with 21 victories, 19 draws and 23 losses. However, it can not be said that after this Cooper went down, with the contract signed by another Argentinean club "Lanus".

Going to Lanus

Hector Cooper, whose biography is considered in the article, spent the last two years in Argentina, namely in Lanus. This time his results were more impressive, but he did not manage to win the Argentine Championship. But his team received the CONMEBOL Cup - the second most prestigious in South America after the Copa Libertadores. This was the first victory of the club in this tournament and the first trophy of Cooper as a coach.

His results in Argentina did not go unnoticed, so in the summer of 1997, Héctor received an invitation from the Spanish "Mallorca", which he gladly accepted, saying goodbye to Argentine football.

Moving to Europe

So, the new club, headed by Hector Cooper, is "Mallorca". What could he achieve in Europe? As in previous cases, in the Spanish club Hector spent two seasons, further improving his performance. In addition, in 1998 he was able to bring the club to the final of the Cup of Spain, where the team lost the penalty to the great "Barcelona". The following season, "Mallorca" was able to participate in the Super Cup of Spain, which won, as well as in the Cup of UEFA Cup holders, which reached the final, but lost to the Italian "Lazio".

Such an impressive success fueled interest in the young Argentine coach, so in the summer of 1999 he received an invitation from Valencia, a much larger Spanish club.

Successes with "Valencia"

Each time Hector Cooper, whose achievements gradually accumulated, performed a little better than the previous one. So with the "Valencia" happened the same thing. It was with him, "Bats" came to a completely new level. In his first year of work with this team, Cooper won the Spanish Super Cup, beating Barcelona. In the same year, he brought "Valencia" to the final of the Champions League - the most prestigious club tournament in Europe, where he lost to Madrid "Real". And the next year, Cooper repeated the achievement, but again could not win, his team lost this time on a penalty shootout Munich Bayern.

Such results ensured the fame of the coach in Europe, and in 2001 he headed one of the strongest clubs in Italy - the Milan "Inter".

Work in Inter

It would seem that the career of the coach is in full swing, and in the near future it will be difficult to calculate which trophies will be collected by Hector Cooper. "Valencia", however, became the last club with which he at least won something. Moving to Inter, Cooper showed impressive results, winning 57 out of 110 matches in two years - this is his best result for the club career. But while he was able only in the second season to achieve more or less impressive success, when his team took second place in the Italian Championship, losing to Turin "Juventus". For the first time, Cooper stayed for the third season, but was dismissed one and a half months after his start. After that, Hector Cooper, whose career went downhill, decided to take a break.

Return

A year later Cooper accepted the offer of "Mallorca" to head the club again, however it was already a completely different team, with which for two years he was able to win only 13 of 54 matches. But, as it turned out, it was not the worst result.

In the summer of 2007, the coach signed a contract with Betis, another Spanish club from the bottom of the table. But he could not bring something new, in fourteen matches the team won only two wins. Naturally, he was quickly dismissed.

In the spring of 2008, Cooper was able to find a job in the Italian "Parma", but even there his results left much to be desired: again the coach led the team only to two wins in ten games, so he was fired at the end of the season.

The post of coach in the national team

After a series of setbacks with the clubs, Hector Cooper decided to try himself in the national teams, having accepted the offer from Georgia. However, it all ended very badly. It can be safely said that it was a complete failure and the worst result in the coach's career. Under his leadership, the Georgians played 16 games, in which a draw was observed in four games, and only one was won. In October 2009, Cooper was fired, after which he returned to work as a coach in clubs.

A new beginning with Aris and a further decline

Less than a month after parting with the national team of Georgia, Cooper signed a contract with the Greek club "Aris". It was there that he managed to prove to everyone that he was capable of something else. In the first year, Cooper contrived to take the far not the strongest team to the final of the Greek Cup, where, unfortunately, she lost to one of the strongest clubs in the country, Panathinaikos. The second season was not so successful, so in the winter of 2011 Cooper left his post, and in the summer of 2011 he returned to Spain and headed the local Racing.

In "Racing", however, the worst period of the coach's career occurred, but only in relation to the clubs, not the teams. In 13 games the team scored 9 points, having won only one victory, so in November 2011 the coach was left without a job.

A month later he found a job in the Turkish Orduspor, where he worked for almost two years and showed fairly average results with 14 wins in 50 games. As a result, Cooper was still dismissed in April 2013 and was out of work until the fall of the same year.

In the autumn, the coach was invited by the Arab club Al-Wasl, but quickly became disillusioned with his decision. Cooper was able to bring the team only 15 points in 16 games, which is why he was fired as early as March 2014, before the end of the season. "Al-Wasl" was the last club that Cooper coached to date. The fact is that in 2015 he returned to work with teams, but this time he was lucky.

Work with the national team of Egypt

Cooper spent a year without work, as he could not find the employer with whom the conditions that satisfied both sides would be agreed. And only in March 2015 he signed a contract with the Egyptian national team, which immediately began to train. The Egyptian national football team is a much stronger team than the Georgian team that Cooper coached earlier. Therefore, it is not surprising that his results were better than a few years ago. But hardly anyone expected that his work with this team would be so much better.

His work with the team, Cooper started with five consecutive victories, but the winning series was interrupted by the defeat of the Chad national team in qualifying for the final part of the African Cup. It would seem that Cooper again blundered, and he will have to look for a new job. However, he managed to win a decisive victory in the second leg with a score of 4: 0 and bring the national team to the final stage.

In the group stage, six games were played, the first of which ended with a draw 1: 1 with the Nigerians. But then things went much better for the Egyptians, and they won in all matches, except for a fight with Mali, which also ended in a draw. In addition, the team of Egypt on football, Cooper scored two wins in the qualifying games for the 2018 World Cup.

As for the African Cup, the Egyptians were able to reach the finals, having defeated Morocco and Burkina Faso on the way, but having lost to the Cameroonians in the finals. It was quite an impressive result, so the Egyptian Football Federation decided to leave Cooper at the helm of the team so that he could bring it to the World Cup and try to achieve the best results there. His last match with this team to date took place on March 28 this year. It was a friendly match against the team of Togo, which the Egyptians won with a crushing 3-0.

Overall result

In total for today the Egyptian national team under the leadership of Cooper played 28 matches, of which only three were lost, and five ended in a draw. Twenty fights were won, and this is currently the best result in Cooper's career. His team won 71 percent of the matches, and the best before this point the coach had in "Inter" - 51 percent of the fights won. So you can safely say that Cooper has found the perfect place for work.