Dubai: The question on everyone's lips is how long Diego Maradona plans to stay at Al Wasl after the footballing legend landed in Dubai last week.
The Argentinian icon is yet to face the press but is surely expecting to be grilled when his time comes.
Maradona oversaw 12 games in two months at Argentina's Mandiyu de Corrientes in 1994 — he won one, lost six, drew five.
In 1995 he took charge of Racing Club de Allevaneda for four months, winning two, losing six and drawing three. Arguments with the chairman and self-confessed boredom ended both stints prematurely.
His management of Argentina resulted in 14 wins, five losses and one draw over two years.
The team scraped through to the World Cup in 2010 despite a 6-1 drubbing at the hands of Bolivia and had looked good in the earlier stages — but a 4-0 humbling against Germany in the quarter-finals put the brakes on the party and Maradona was once again on the look out for new employers.
That side was derided by Argentinean reporter Carlos Pasman as: "The worst national team I've seen in my lifetime. They don't play football. We spend the whole game with our backs pressed against the goal line."
Emotive coaching had once again been obliterated by tactical nous.
Leading the chants
BBC columnist Tim Vickery said: "Maradona runs on emotion. As a player he was able to turn it into physical energy. As a fan he is similar, taking off his shirt and swinging it round his head as he leads the chanting.
"When former prominent players take up coaching, many complain about the difficulty of acquiring the patience necessary in the new function. Will Maradona be able to acquire it?"
Convert this to UAE football where barely a month went by last season without a managerial sacking — there were 13 in all. Quick tempers and short attention spans can often equal disaster for coaches.
Like riding a bucking bronco, the local and international press will focus on Maradona's tenure, waiting for that all-important explosion.
The circus has come to town and the stopwatches have started, maybe unfairly so, but as history tells us this league is uncompromising.
David O'Leary, once deemed one of Britain's most promising managers and arguably less emotive and more tactically astute than Maradona, lasted just eight months at Al Ahli last year.
The Fabio Cannavaro-led revolution ended in tears. Attendances slipped to below year-on-year figures by the end of the season despite an early 70.6 per cent boost. The club fell to eighth-place and all that pre-season hope imploded. Will a similar fate befall Al Wasl?
Retirement home
Maradona said he didn't want a graveyard of white elephants when he was unveiled on June 4 at the Zabeel Saray, but with the likes of George Weah, Philip Cocu, Josep Guardiola, Cannavaro, Gabriel Batistuta and Romario all having passed through this region before retirement, GCC football has earned a reputation like Major League Soccer as a footballer's retirement home. Ronald de Boer even called it a graveyard.
Management-wise the trend has continued. Astute coaches including Valery Lobanovsky, Don Revie, Carlos Alberto Parreira, Roy Hogdson and Dick Advocaat have ended fruitless spells here despite success elsewhere.
But if anyone can buck a trend, there's still plenty of admiration, time and hope left for Maradona.
Already praised for moving to two training sessions a day plus handing chances to younger imports in a squad devoid of big names, he has set off on the right foot. It has everyone thinking that maybe this footballing experiment can work.
Everyone deserves a second chance, and this move, albeit tried and failed on multiple occasions, will be the second, third or fourth chance for both Maradona and UAE football. It's definitely worth watching, hopefully for at least a little while longer.
Don Revie
Renowned in England as the man to rile Brian Clough into beating his 11-honours, life in the UAE 1977-80 turned sour.
Valery Lobanovsky
A legendary Ukrainian coach with 30 honours to his name, managed the UAE from 1990-93 to no avail, sacked after lacklustre performances.
David O'Leary
Took a group of youngsters in Leeds United to the Champions League Semi-final in 1999/2000, but lasted just eight months at Al Ahli.
Carlos Alberto Parreira
World Cup winning coach for Brazil in 1994, this footballing journeyman came to the UAE in 1984 to 1988 but failed to make an impact.
Roy Hodgson
Fifteen honours for a career on the road, Hodgson's UAE tenure 2002-2004 will evoke a few memories of players he called ‘lazy'.
