Paulo Bento
Portuguese retired footballer Paulo Bento is the current manager of Portugal and has made an impact on the Portuguese team, both as a former player and a coach. Having played for two out of three major teams in his nation and also for the national team, Paulo has managed top division totals of 284 games and 16 goals. His perfect tackling ability as a defensive midfielder has risen his fame and success to the current position.
Born on 20th June 1969 in Lisbon, Portugal, Paulo Jorge Gomes Bento played professionally in his homeland for teams like the C.F. Estrela da Amadora, Vitória de Guimarães and S.L. Benfica. Following a transfer to the Asturias club La Liga side Real Oviedo he responsible for maintaining its top status. Paulo then moved to Sporting Club de Portugal. With Sporting Club de Portugal as his current team, he retired as a footballer after achieving the double in 2002 and contributing 31 games with a single goal in the league.
As for the Portuguese national team, he gained 35 caps in his career. His debut game was on 15th January 1992 in a draw with Spain, the last game being a loss to South Korea on 2002 FIFA World Cup. Paulo also played for the UEFA Euro 2000.
After retiring at an age of 35, Bento got the job of Sporting’s youth team coach and helped the team win the junior championship in 2005. He was then promoted to first team duties in the 2005-06 season despite being relatively inexperienced.
On the second half of the campaign of the team, a series of ten consecutive wins placed Sporting along with league champions F.C Porto. Sporting came second in that season and the following season, thus earning itself a qualification to the UEFA Champions League. With this achievement Paulo was established in the position of a top flight manager responsible for upbringing youth football icons to the light.
Paulo signed a contract for an extension of two years in 2007, the first season of which was a very irregular one. Despite many good players leaving the club, he managed to lead Sporting to the third qualification for the Champions League with a second place finish. He also managed to retain the domestic cup by winning over Porto in the final.
Under his wing, the team managed to break a number of long-standing club records, out of which was an amazing first season without home defeats, a first winning over of Portuguese cups since 1974 and a first time since 1962 that Sporting finished in the top two league positions in three consecutive seasons.
Another of his achievement was becoming the only fifth manager in the history of Portuguese football to have won back to back Portuguese cups at the age of 38. Despite speculations that the Manchester United were planning to hire Bento as manager Alex Ferguson’s new a s sistant, he quickly denied any speculations and made it clear that he was planning to stay at Sporting.
In the 2008-09 season, after the addition of a number of players, he managed to get Sporting to a victory in the Supercup against the champions Porto. This added to his already long list of records in his managerial tenure.
Bento was appropriately named Papa Tacas, a cup eater, for having acquired back to back Portuguese Cups and having established himself as the second most successful manager in history. For the first time in Sporting’s history, Benot led the team to a win over FC Shakhtar Donetsk to secure a qualification for the Champions League. Also broken was the club’s record number of points in the UEFA’s main competition thus becoming the first team to qualify from the group phase.
Bento then lead Sporting to break the record for most number of goals suffered in the Champions League knockout round with a 1-12 defeat in the hands of FC Bayern Munich and also a League Cup final loss against Benfica. This ousting caused uproar of news about fan discontentment towards Bento. He further signed for a two year extension contract. Sporting was unable to kick back into its old form and saw many defeats owing to which, he resigned as manager of Sporting.
As for the national team, Bento succeeded Queiroz as manager on 20th September 2010. His first game in charge was on October whereby Portugal had a 3-1 win against Denmark. Under his reign, Portugal defeated World Cup Champions, Spain on 17th November. Paulo also led the national team to the Euro 2012 semifinals whereby it lost to Spain. As for the 2014 World Cup Qualifiers, Portugal was led into a 4-2 aggregate win over Sweden thus obtaining a spot for the finals. His contract has been extended up to Euro 2016.
Paulo’s height is 5 feet 9 inches and his weight is 74 kg. His family and personal details are not much known about, the only insight to his personal life being his photo or his reactions to a game his team plays. His salary in the 2012 Euro was 1.4 million Euros, but the present status of his salary is undisclosed. Paulo has managed to make an impact on the football fraternity both as aplayer and a manager and will certainly thrive to do so for his home team Portugal.
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