Renard brings his magic touch to Saudi Arabia

AL RAYYAN, Qatar: Saudi Arabia fans will long celebrate their team's stunning victory over Argentina at the World Cup on Tuesday (Nov 22) and their French coach Herve Renard could quickly become a national hero.

Saudi Arabia had never previously won their first match at a World Cup, suffering a humiliating 8-0 defeat by Germany in 2002 and a 5-0 loss to Russia in 2018.

They fell behind to an early Lionel Messi penalty against Argentina but inspired by a halftime team talk from Renard fought back to secure a famous 2-1 win over the twice world champions.

The 54-year-old Renard began to make his name as a coach in 2012 when he led Zambia to the African Nations Cup title for the first time during his second spell in charge of the team.

He moved on to manage Ivory Coast and led them to the African crown in 2015 with a dramatic shootout win over Ghana before taking Morocco to the World Cup for the first time in 20 years.

After losing to Iran and Portugal in 2018, Morocco produced a superb display to draw 2-2 with Spain and went on to win the African Nations Cup in 2019, for the first time since 1976.

"When I decided to coach this team (Saudi Arabia) three years ago, I found all the support, we have a great federation president and also the Ministry of Sports," Renard said after the victory over Argentina.

"When we met with Prince (Mohammed bin Salman, the Crown Prince), he did not put any pressure on us, and this is wonderful. Being pressured does not work every time."

POWERFUL MOTIVATOR

Renard is not only a fine technical coach but also a powerful motivator.

"We had a crazy coach who gave us instructions and motivated us strongly during halftime," Saudi Arabia midfielder Abdel-Ilah al-Maliki told Al-Kass TV station after the win over