5 of the best Player-Manager combinations of all time in football

Modified Dec 20, 2018 07:16 GMT

Pele, the greatest footballer of all time, had a good rapport with all his managers

#4 Lothar Matthaus-Franz Beckenbauer

Lothar Matthaus and Franz Beckenbauer were two of the best

The two greatest players Germany have ever produced combined to make their national team a great force in world football. Beckenbauer was the German coach in the 1986 World Cup and they reached the final.

They fought tremendously but lost 2-3 to an Argentine team inspired by Diego Maradona. Lothar Matthaus was given the responsibility to man-mark Maradona and did a wonderful job till the dying minutes of the match when Maradona delivered a through ball to Burruchaga, who finished superbly to win the match.

Those two again combined in the 1990 World Cup and this time won the tournament for the Germans. Matthaus played as an attacking midfielder in the tournament and scored 4 goals.

He did not win the Golden Ball but was widely recognized as the best player of the World Cup by football experts worldwide. Germany’s football was typically efficient and almost faultless in 1990.

Matthaus lifted the World Cup as the German captain and Beckenbauer became the first man to win the World Cup both as a player and a manager.

Edited by Debjyoti Samanta