Not every successful career starts spectacularly well but Andoni Iraola’s journey to Liverpool will take some beating. Seven years ago, he was sacked from his first job in management after a winless streak in the Cypriot top division with AEK Larnaca.
Iraola learned from the experience and rebuilt his career back in Spain with Mirandes before really impressing with Rayo Vallecano and Bournemouth to earn his opportunity at Anfield. Nevertheless, it must be curious for his old colleagues to witness the rise.
Were there any believers that day in January when Larnaca drew 2-2 at home to Ermis Aradippou, the team that would go on to finish bottom of the table? It extended the run of league games without a win to six and Iraola paid the price for that streak with his job.
Were there clues beyond the results that Iraola was destined for bigger things and merely the victim of a trigger-happy firing culture at the Cypriot club? Speaking to David Catala, who played under him at Larnaca, including in that final game, he did see promising signs.
“He already had very clear ideas of what he wanted,” Catala tells Sky Sports. “You saw it and, for sure, all the players were speaking about how he was going to become a fantastic coach. But to reach this level? To say that he would be at Liverpool? That is a big claim.”
David Catala celebrates scoring for Iraola’s Larnaca side against Bayer Leverkusen
Iraola had spent his entire playing career in Europe at Athletic Club prior to a brief sojourn stateside with New York City. His first foray into the managerial game with Larnaca put him outside of his comfort zone, even if there was a Spanish constituency in the club.
His initial impact was impressive. Three rounds of qualifying for the Europa League group stage were successfully negotiated with wins over Dundalk, Sturm Graz and Trencin. Just as significantly, the players at Larnaca readily embraced Iraola’s illuminating ideas.
“To be in the Europa League for a club in Cyprus was amazing,” explains Catala. “And the work that he did was good. These were the same ideas that he wants at Liverpool, actually, pressing high and wanting to be very aggressive with and without the ball.”
In Cyprus at that time, this was particularly rare. “The rhythm of the game there was very slow. I was able to play there until I was 38 years old because that rhythm was not so high.” Iraola had a different vision of the game, learned under Marcelo Bielsa in Bilbao.
“When Andoni came, it changed.”
Andoni Iraola attempted to introduce a pressing game during his time at AEK Larnaca
Catala explains: “Everything was more explosive with him, more rhythm, more intensity. You saw how Marcelo did it with Athletic Club. I remember sometimes it was like that for us. Crazy things like following man-to-man all over the pitch. That was crazy as players.”
He recognises now that it was a taste of the future of the game. “Football has gone in that direction. The way you have to press. It changed the mentality of the players.” Even the game in that country. “He changed a little bit the rhythm of the league in Cyprus.”
For a while, it worked. At the start of December, 10 games in, Larnaca were second in the table to Limassol, the only team to beat them during that period. Iraola’s side were actually ahead of the six-time reigning champions and the eventual title winners APOEL.
But it all unravelled quickly. There was a 5-1 home defeat to Bayer Leverkusen in Europe that was sandwiched between a trio of away trips on the island that yielded no wins. A home defeat by the odd goal increased the pressure before the brief Christmas break.
A loss away to Omonia followed by that draw against strugglers Ermis sealed his fate. There were some formation tweaks but nothing major. “He did not change too much in terms of his thinking about the way of playing against different teams,” recalls Catala.
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The real lesson was that even in an environment that was supposed to be away from the spotlight for such a high-profile figure during his playing days, pressure comes quickly in football. “If you are not getting results, it is difficult to have the trust of the owners.”
Catala explains: “Cyprus is very difficult for coaches, and especially for young coaches, because the owners of the football clubs, they are very passionate. And at the moment that you are not getting the results, they sack the coach like they are just peanuts.
“As soon as you lose games, especially against the lower teams, immediately the fans are speaking with the owner and the owner is going crazy. You cannot have the stability that maybe you need when you are a young coach. This is what happened to Andoni.”
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For Catala, who would go on to manage Larnaca himself, lasting a little longer than Iraola, he has tried to take things from his old coach. And believes Iraola too will have benefited from that experience. “It was still a good choice to start there,” he insists.
“Cyprus is not an easy place for anyone to work but it is a good place for a young coach to start their journey. He had the opportunity to coach a team in the Europa League, for example. Unfortunately, football everywhere is now very unstable for all coaches.
“It was a short period. But he would have learned many things from his experience in Cyprus about how to manage situations. It was his first job, you have to take something from that. For sure, he has improved a lot since then and he has developed himself.”
Into the Liverpool coach, no less. “I am happy for him. If you look at the last years, you can see that he is obviously a fantastic coach. I cannot say that I did not expect it, but it is a little bit of a surprise.” From the sack at Larnaca to Liverpool, how could it not be?
Disclaimer : This story is auto aggregated by a computer programme and has not been created or edited by DOWNTHENEWS. Publisher: skynews.com
