Ex-Swedish boss Janne Andersson linked with Ireland managerial job

The 61-year-old ended his six-year stint with Swedes last November

Fri, 22 Mar, 2024 - 03:00

John Fallon

Former Sweden manager Janne Andersson is the latest candidate to be linked with the Ireland vacancy.

The 61-year-old ended his six-year stint with Swedes last November but yesterday admitted he was close to a new national team job, possibly next week, having already rejected Latvia's overtures.

Marc Canham, the director of football leading the FAI’s search, flagged when unveiling John O’Shea as interim boss for the friendlies over the next four days against Belgium and Switzerland that an appointment would be announced and start work in early April.

The “existing contractual obligations” obstacle Canham cited for the delay in April doesn’t appear to apply to Andersson but his deal with the Swedish FA was to run until the end of this summer’s Euros finals.

He also favoured a break for family reasons and recently recovered from elective surgery.

Andersson’s domestic success, leading Norrköping to their first Allsvenskan title for 2016, clinched the Hamstad native the Swedish job after Euro 2016.

He won 48 games of his 94 in charge, eliminating Netherlands and Italy on Sweden's way to reaching the 2018 World Cup quarter-final, where they lost to England.

After topping their Nations League B, the Swedes got out of their delayed Euro 2020 finals group, only to be beaten by Ukraine in extra-time of the last-16 tie.

That upward trajectory was stalled by a few setbacks, missing out on the 2022 World Cup through losing 2-0 to Poland in a playoff and failing to get out of their Euro 2024 qualification pool.

He made a teary farewell with a 2-0 dead rubber win over Estonia in November after they were out of contention to prevent Belgium and Austria claiming the two places for Germany this summer.

“I have received some concrete requests,” Andersson told aftonbladet.se.

“Latvia was concrete and I was hungry but it was a little too early.

“If it's the right thing, it can happen, but I also feel that I've become picky.

“I've had the job I'd most like to have in the whole world, so if I'm going to do something else, it must be the right thing.

“We'll see what happens but I have something going on.

“If everything falls into place, it will probably be ready next week. A federation job.”

The FAI turned to alternatives when their No 1 target Lee Carsley couldn’t be convinced to leave his position with European U21 champions England.

The ex-Ireland midfielder didn’t rule out the possibility of managing the country he represented 40 times in the future.

International experience constituted the most important criteria laid out by the FAI recruitment trio of Canham, chief executive Jonathan Hill and board member Packie Bonner.

That ruled former Celtic boss Neil Lennon out when the field was whittled down from the initial December discussions with contenders.

Andersson possesses that in abundance and the salary scope, in the region of €600,000 per year, places him in the bracket of attainable targets.

Dejan Kulusevski, of the players handed his debut by Andersson was diplomatic this week when asked to compare new boss Jon Dahl Tomasson to his predecessor "They're different people who think in different ways,” said the Tottenham winger.

“He (Tomasson) has a completely different style of play and wants us to play as fast as possible.

“It's fast throw-ins, fast freekicks and we should waste as little time as possible.

“Janne was a very nice person but in football you move on.

“Jon has a really nice style of play and is a positive person. It's going to be great fun to play in a different way.”