HARRY Kewell has vowed to walk his own path as he makes his way through the coaching ranks, a journey he hopes will return him to the dugouts of the English Premier League.
But the man voted as the greatest Socceroo says he has no idea whether his coaching career will be as successful as his playing one.
Kewell, 37, has started his stint on the sidelines as coach of EPL club Watford’s under-21 side.
It’s a lowly beginning for the Champions League winner and two-time World Cup player, but Kewell has no qualms.
“I love it, absolutely love it,” he told AAP.
The coaching lifestyle seems to work for Kewell. The prodigiously talented forward often looked strained — both on and off the field — during injury-hit stints with Melbourne’s two A-League clubs that finished his career.
Harry Kewell is learning his trade at Watford.Source:Twitter
But the wincing is gone, even if his voice is hoarse from three days in the middle of a Melbourne field where he is coaching juniors this week.
Just a stone’s throw away from the home ground of Socceroos coach Ange Postecoglou’s old club South Melbourne, Kewell says he holds dear one piece of advice from the national coach.
“The one thing Ange told me, and this has stuck with me, is go your own way,” he said. “Once you start listening to other people, you run into trouble.
“Me, I want to do it my way. It may work — it may not. Am I going to be a great manager? I don’t know.”
The football paths of Postecoglou and Kewell never crossed, with Kewell just missing Postecoglou’s stint in charge of national under-age teams, and leaving Victory before the 50-year-old took charge.
Harry Kewell takes the kids through a striking drill during his Harry Kewell Academy. Pic Mark Brake.Source:Herald Sun
True to the advice received, Kewell’s early coaching philosophy stands apart from Postecoglou’s commitment to tactical discipline.
“I’d love to be a coach that can create thinking footballers,” Kewell said. “There’s a lot of footballers out there that will turn up to training, listen to their manager and do what they’re told.
“Yes, they’ve got to do that because managers do all the homework. But that all could go out the window in five minutes if the opposition is playing all over you.
“At Watford, I say to my boys it’s not about creating robots; it’s about becoming a thinking footballer.”
Kewell said his long-term ambition would be to succeed Postecoglou as Socceroos coach but insisted his head was still with his under-21s.
“To be able to manage in the Premier League is the ultimate,” he said. “The only thing bigger would be the national team but there’s a long, long way to go yet.”
[Source:- news.com]