{"id":4418,"date":"2018-01-05T20:00:30","date_gmt":"2018-01-05T11:00:30","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/football-tribe.com\/arabia\/?p=4418"},"modified":"2018-01-04T13:51:35","modified_gmt":"2018-01-04T10:51:35","slug":"football-tribe-awards-encore-2017s-top-5-managers-in-asia","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/football-tribe.com\/arabia\/2018\/01\/05\/football-tribe-awards-encore-2017s-top-5-managers-in-asia\/","title":{"rendered":"Football Tribe Awards Encore: 2017’s Top 5 Managers in Asia"},"content":{"rendered":"

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After the wonderful reaction we received for our first annual Football Tribe Awards, the Tribe team came back from New Year’s celebration to bring our readers one more recap of the year in Asian football with our Top 5 Managers in Asia.<\/p>\n

Before you read it, don’t forget to check out our previous awards:<\/p>\n

Top 10 Asian Players in Europe<\/a><\/p>\n

Top 20 Southeast Asian Players<\/a><\/p>\n

Top 30 Players in Asia<\/a><\/p>\n

Who made the cut? Click through to the next page to find out:<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

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The former \u201cTeam Melli\u201d manager returned to Iran in 2015 to resurrect Tehran giants Persepolis. In his first full season on the Persepolis bench his side fell just short in the league on goal difference but in the second one, Ivankovic’s men clinched the trophy three weeks before the end of the season. In 2017 Persepolis also won the Super Cup and reached the AFC Champions League semi-final<\/span><\/p>\n

More than their results, Persepolis\u2019 performances in last two years have cemented Branko\u2019s position amongst the Reds fans. In the current campaign they remain on top with a nine-point buffer ahead of second place, and it looks as though Branko will have another successful year ahead of him.<\/span>\"\"<\/p>\n

After five and a half seasons of chronic underachievement under former manager Mihailo Petrovic, second-time caretaker manager Takafumi Hori took a side that had forgotten its potential and instilled a new sense of confidence simply by reminding his players that they were capable of defending, not just attacking.<\/p>\n

An inspired comeback against heavily-favored Kawasaki Frontale and spiritedly defensive showings against Shanghai SIPG and Al Hilal brought Urawa Reds back to the pinnacle of Asian football. Their next step will be to become the domestic powerhouse they have projected themselves as being for so many years.\"\"<\/p>\n

Less than three years after his abrupt departure from a Sagan Tosu side that he had led from the J2 to the top of the J1 table, Yoon returned to the J.League in 2017 when he was handed the reigns at Cerezo Osaka, who themselves were back in the J1 for the first time after two seasons in the second division.<\/p>\n

With a wildcard side that looked like it could struggle or succeed in equal amounts, Yoon chose the latter and steered Cerezo to not just one but two cup titles – their first-ever major trophies. Between the J.League YBC Levain Cup, Emperor’s Cup, and a third-place finish in the J1, Yoon accomplished one of the best seasons by a foreign manager in J.League history and will surely go from strength to strength.\"\"<\/p>\n

The achievements of Ramon Diaz’s second season at Al Hilal were slightly marred by their defeat to Urawa Reds in the ACL final. However, no one can deny his success in bringing a domestic double to the Saudi Arabian club in 2017. Before the Argentine manager took over, Al-Hilal struggled to win the league and finished in second or third place for five years straight, but last year they again became champions.<\/p>\n

Diaz also played an important part in bringing decisive players like Omar Khribin, who proved to be a vital player in Al-Hilal’s 2017 glory and was named #1 in Football Tribe’s Top 30 Asian Players of 2017<\/a>.<\/p>\n

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There is a reason why Iran are considered by some to be strong dark horses at this year’s FIFA World Cup in Russia, and his name is Carlos Queiroz. What he has done over the last four years have been nothing short of tremendous but 2017 was truly a positive year for Iran’s national team.<\/p>\n

Team Melli only lost one out of 11 official matches, conceding just six goals in the process. At the same time, they clinched positive results against teams like China, Russia and even Venezuela. Iran were one of the first teams to secure their ticket to Russia and the former Manchester United assistant boss deserves much of the credit for that feat.\"\"<\/p>\n

Our first honorable mention goes to Syria head coach Ayman Hakeem, who performed miracles in getting his side to accomplish so much despite playing all of their home games outside of their country. Their Cinderella run through World Cup qualifying ended only in the last hour with a narrow defeat to Australia. Syria not only gave the Socceroos a strong run for their money: they were also the only team to score against Iran in the qualifying phase, a testament to their pluckiness. One can only imagine the inspirational locker room talks Ayman provided to his players, who represented a war-torn nation in complicated circumstances.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

October 2017 was a sad month for Korean fans as Cho Jin-ho one of South Korea’s best managers, passed away at the age of 44.<\/p>\n

The three teams Cho Jin-ho managed were not highly-ranked sides; Daejeon Citizen and Busan I’Park played in the K League Challenge while Sangju Sangmu, the country’s military team, can often be found at the bottom of the Classic’s split format. Yet his leadership shined through under such adversity.<\/p>\n

Cho’s 2014 Daejeon recorded 20 victories in one season for the first time in the club history, leading them to first place in the Challenge and promotion. In 2016, Sangju became the first military team to participate in the top of the Classic’s split, finishing the season in sixth place. He was successful at Busan I’Park as well, leading the team to this year’s K League promotion play-off as well as the semi-final of FA Cup.<\/p>\n

Following his death from a sudden heart attack, Busan managed to defeat Suwon Bluewings and reach the FA Cup final. According to acting manager Lee Seung-yub, that win came thanks the Cho’s analysis of Busan’s opponents. The loss of his ability and potential at such a young age is a sad one for both the Korean football community and Asian football at large.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

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Who do you think should have been in our Top 5 and which managers do you think will succeed in 2018? Follow us on Facebook<\/a>\u00a0and Twitter<\/a> and join the discussion!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

After the wonderful reaction we received for our first annual Football Tribe Awards, the Tribe team came back from New Year’s celebration to bring our readers one more recap of the year in Asian football with our Top 5 Managers in Asia. Before you read it, don’t forget to check out our previous awards: Top 10 Asian Players in Europe Top 20 Southeast Asian Players Top 30 Players in Asia Who made the cut? Click through to the next page to find out:<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":4419,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4418","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/football-tribe.com\/arabia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4418","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/football-tribe.com\/arabia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/football-tribe.com\/arabia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/football-tribe.com\/arabia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/football-tribe.com\/arabia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4418"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/football-tribe.com\/arabia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4418\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/football-tribe.com\/arabia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/4419"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/football-tribe.com\/arabia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4418"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/football-tribe.com\/arabia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4418"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/football-tribe.com\/arabia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4418"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}