Renard, the coach who went from cleaning buildings to giving the bell against Messi's Argentina

Before taking the wand, the

got on the garbage truck for eight years;

he also cleaned buildings.

That tanned Adonis in a tight-fitting white shirt who led Saudi Arabia this Tuesday to one of the most surprising World Cup victories in memory (1-2 against Argentina) has his own story behind it.

That of the boy who dreamed of being a soccer player and found himself as a coach in a destination that he had never imagined.

And in between life, the one that is tinged with difficulties in the first or third world.

"I have seen people who only need to live is their own happiness," explains Hervè Renard (Aix-les-Bains, France, 54 years old), who signed a contract with Saudi Arabia three years ago.

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“A coach is someone who has a higher-than-average capacity for adaptation,” he warns.

His career speaks for him, with a past in the national teams of Ghana, Zambia, Angola, the Ivory Coast and Morocco before being seduced by petrodollars: “Money is not an insignificant issue, but it is not the main thing either.

I needed a change, a sporting challenge and, above all, to experience a World Cup again”.

Renard faced Spain four years ago.

In front of Morocco he scratched a tie, now with Arabia he defeated Argentina, one of the favorites.

"When you come to a World Cup you have to believe that everything is possible," he signed after the feat.

The one in the Maghreb was, until now, his last African station.

Renard's career cannot be understood without looking towards that continent, which he arrived at fifteen years ago at the hands of Claude Le Roy, one of those globetrotting technicians who forge his legend through various destinations.

With him he had already been in China, Vietnam and even in the fourth English category and the third French before answering a call from Ghana.

Renard was already 40 years old and for almost twenty years he knew that he was not going to be a great footballer despite having changed for three years in the same dressing room as Zinedine Zidane.

The Marseillaise star began his short career at Cannes, but Renard took the opposite route: he fell into amateur football and combined his passion for the ball with hard work.

"Life is not easy," he assumes.

"Leave away.

Masters are always prepared to be surpassed by their female disciples," Le Roy told him when he received a call from Zambia to lead a team in which Renard covered two stages, with a disheartening interval in Angola, where he resigned due to non-payment.

In the heart of the dark continent he became a legend.

First he led Zambia to an African Cup victory that no one expected and then he enlisted with the Ivory Coast, the team he defeated in the final, to take it to the same level and become the only European to win twice african champion.

He was already "the white magician".

With Morocco, he made the leap from 81st in the FIFA ranking to 45th and led the team to its first World Cup after twenty years.

He was paired with Viviane, the widow of Bruno Metsu, another of the Frenchmen who triumphed on the continent at the helm of the Senegal team in 2002. He now lives in Dakar.

“I couldn't do it anywhere other than Africa,” he explains.

From there he has an airlift to Arabia.

“I have the advantage that all my players are in the Saudi league and monitoring is easier.

But to raise the level it would be good if they played abroad, for example in the European Champions League, ”he explains.

In any case, of the nine Arab footballers who arrived in the Spanish league a little over four years ago to tiptoe to a LaLiga agreement with the federation and the Saudi government, only Aldawsari, scorer of the second goal against Argentina, has been called up. by Renard to play the World Cup.

“I look people in the eye and speak clearly”

The typical portrait of the Saudi footballer was not easy to model at the highest competitive level.

“These are stars in their country, where they are classified as demigods and earn millionaire salaries.

And standing out there is not easy, ”explained the coach from Pontevedra Raúl Caneda, with a successful past in the country, when in the winter of 2018 those footballers he considered deserving arrived in Spain.

Technical, but not very hard, Saudi football failed resoundingly in the World Cup in Russia, but it has given the

in Qatar with a very recognizable style in Renard's script, who likes to raise the defensive line and values ​​​​capacity more to overcome the rival, recover and launch towards the goal that the risk of leaving spaces between defenders and goalkeeper.

The script calls for titanic footballers.

The rest is motivation.

“I have a voice that transmits.

I look people in the eye and speak clearly, ”he explained in an interview published by FIFA shortly before the World Cup.

After beating Argentina he did not lower the demand: “In the first part the pressure and the determination were not what we have to expose.

We can't play like this.

In a World Cup you have to give everything”.

After leading 12 games so far this year and winning just three, all 1-0, against Oman, Australia and Iceland.

After drawing with China, Panama or Honduras, Renard made magic again and this time on the biggest stage.

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