Dubai: Edgardo Bauza’s appointment as UAE coach is a massive gamble considering he doesn’t speak English and his only experience in the region is four months spent managing Saudi Arabia’s Al Nassr back in 2009.

The choice was to go for a big name with international experience or go for a local or at least locally-based coach, who had more familiarity with the players and the region.

In Bauza they arguably have neither of these two things. He was only in charge of Argentina — his first job in international management — for eight games before being sacked, and before that, he was renowned exclusively for his club coaching credentials in South America where he twice won the Copa Libertadores.

But for a brief spell in charge of the world’s greatest player, having been the man to have tempted Lionel Messi out of international retirement, he’s hardly the name to provide wow factor and a much-needed boost ahead of the UAE’s must-win remaining three World Cup qualifiers.

But what he is, is a man spurned from his recent experiences with Argentina and desperate to restore his image on the international stage.

That one factor makes Bauza a potentially deadly acquisition for the UAE. Bauza, like the UAE players, has shown great promise but not quite made it on the highest level, yet. The two parties are very similar to one another in that way, and therefore they both need each other, and will both equally need for this tenure to work.

For that reason we can forget any doubts surrounding his appointment and trust in the fact that Bauza is indeed a quality coach, who is eager to reaffirm his status. After all, you don’t win two Copa Libertadores titles with the likes of Ecuador’s LDU Quito and Argentina’s San Lorenzo, then get entrusted with the Argentina job, for knowing nothing.

Everyone must now rally around the coach to help ease his transition and make up for his lack of local knowledge, to ensure success, trusting in the honesty of the fact that he needs, and is eager, to prove himself.

That can be a much more powerful tool than any supposed big name, and while he may be largely unfamiliar with the region, fresh eyes and a new approach, built from the reaction to failure, could be exactly what the UAE needs.

A lot of attention will be placed on the next three remaining 2018 World Cup qualifiers, but in truth Bauza will need a miracle to still qualify, as the UAE are dependent on the results of other nations.

Therefore he shouldn’t be judged on those results alone and must instead be given time to build for the long-term.

Bauza alluded to that bigger picture in Thursday’s press conference, and the only hope is that he is given the time to put a structure in place that he wasn’t granted with Argentina. Unlike Argentina, the UAE can now afford to give him that luxury to prove what both are truly capable of.