Two jobs at once? Could Hong Myung-bo pull a Hiddink?

Football

Published: 10 Jul. 2024, 17:21 Updated: 10 Jul. 2024, 17:53

Two jobs at once? Could Hong Myung-bo pull a Hiddink?

Ulsan HD manager Hong Myung-bo instructs his players in the second-round match against Jeonbuk Hyundai Motors in the 2023-24 AFC Champions League quarterfinals at Munsu Football Stadium in Ulsan on March 12. [YONHAP]

Hong Myung-bo, the immediately controversial pick to lead the Korean national football team as its permanent manager, spent months promising to stay with his club.

Technically, he could still keep that vow — it's been done before.

It was just last Friday that Hong, who has spent the last three years at Ulsan HD, said he if he was approached with the job in Ulsan, he would take a train to Seoul just to avoid having the conversation.

But over the weekend, news broke that KFA Technical Director Lee Lim-saeng had tapped Hong to lead that national team, confirming in a press conference Monday that the Ulsan boss was a perfect fit for Korea.

Yet Hong will still be managing Ulsan when they face Gwangju on Wednesday evening. In fact, Ulsan say he will be hanging around for a while.

Hong is set to hold a press conference with reporters after Ulsan’s match against Gwangju at Munsu Football Stadium in Ulsan at 10 p.m. Wednesday. It's expected to be a fiery affair — Hong's sudden appointment as national team manager hasn't gone down well with domestic football fans — and could be a chance for Hong to explain exactly how he still seems to be doing two jobs and what he intends to do about it.

If his plan is to try and do everything, everywhere all at once, he wouldn't be the first.

There’s a small crop of managers who have managed both club and country — including Sir Alex Ferguson and former Korean national team manager Guus Hiddink.

Australia manager Guus Hiddink, also head of PSV Eindhoven, gestures in a match against Japan in their first round Group F World Cup match at Kaiserslautern's Fritz-Walter Stadium on June 12, 2006. Australia came from behind to win the match 3-1. [AFP/YONHAP]

Ferguson did it before his Old Trafford days, where he led Manchester United to 13 titles in the Premier League, in his final year in the Scottish Premiership at Aberdeen.

He helmed Aberdeen from 1978 to 1986 — and was in the middle of the 1985-86 season when then-Scottish national team manager collapsed, Ferguson stepping up to take the reigns. He had already been a part of the national team coaching staff, but appointing a co-manager while he oversaw 10 national team games.

And Hiddink, who led Korea to the semifinals at the 2002 World Cup in Seoul, led the Australian national team at the 2006 World Cup while also at the helm of PSV.

BY MARY YANG AND JIM BULLEY [mary.yang@joongang.co.kr]