HONG KONG : Philippe Troussier, the well-travelled French coach who has been in charge of eight mostly minor national teams over his long career, has thrown his weight behind the expansion of the World Cup finals to 48 sides from 2026. The 68-year-old Parisian, who earned the nickname the 'White Witch Doc
HONG KONG : Philippe Troussier, the well-travelled French coach who has been in charge of eight mostly minor national teams over his long career, has thrown his weight behind the expansion of the World Cup finals to 48 sides from 2026.
"When you know your country has no hope, even less than 1 per cent to go to the World Cup, why develop the pitches? Why pay a foreign coach? Why start a technical programme for the youth?Plenty of traditionalists are unhappy at the increase in the size of the tournament from the 32 teams that have contested every World Cup since 1998, arguing the quality of the competition will be diluted as a result.
Troussier has been tasked with changing that as he looks to build on the work done by Korean Park Hang-seo, who took Vietnam through to the final phase of Asian qualifying for the first time in 2021.
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