Sven Goran-Eriksson


 * Sven.jpg|thumb|300px|right|Sven (Puppet) compared to himself in real life]]Sven.jpg

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Sven
AKA "It". Introduced midway through the first season, Sven was José's sidekick and foil. Hapless, insecure, and slow-witted, Sven did whatever José told him to do, no matter how humiliating. In various episodes, Sven was dressed as a pimp, played piano and guitar, and forced to perform as "The Gimp" from the movie Pulp Fiction. Sven was often confused for Willie Nelson, as the outfit he wore while introducing the "Wayne's Word" segment outraged a one-time telephone guest, "Willie," who complained about his 'impersonator.' He frequently began his sentences with "well" and "very good".

At the beginning of Season two, Sven, who in real life had signed for Mexico, was seen dressed in colorful Mexican garb, with a colorful piñata llama and common Mexican wide-brim hat. In the film special, Sven watched When Harry Met Sally. In Season Two, Sven also visited the jungle for three days. In the time he spent there, he was caught by José sleeping in the same tent as Ant and Dec and was coerced into eating platypus anus.

Following his sacking as manager of Mexico, he was regularly seen touting for work. He was once seen wearing a Sunderland jersey, stroking a black cat (alluding to Sunderland's nickname 'The Black Cats') and saying 'away the lads' in a faux-Northern English accent. He was also then seen on a phone inquiring about jerseys (ie jobs). When offered a Manchester City jersey, he declines, saying he had one before, but it didn't fit him, in reference to his previous tenure as Manchester City boss, when he was sacked after one season. He is also seen wearing a Portsmouth jersey, in reference to speculation he was to take that job following the departure of Tony Adams. He is then seen inquiring on the phone about a job advertised in the Evening Chronicle, a newspaper in England's northeast. After being told the job has been filled, he says to wish Mr. Shearer the best of luck. Most recently he has even dressed as a Mountie in reference to the vacant coaching job at Toronto FC.

Sven in Real Life
After retirement, Eriksson received an offer to become Tord Grip's assistant at Degerfors. A year later, Grip was appointed assistant manager of the Swedish national team, and Eriksson became Degerfors' manager, winning promotion to Division 2 in 1978.

His success with assistant manager Tom Chadney by his side attracted the attention of much larger clubs, and Eriksson joined Göteborg in 1979. He won the Swedish Cup in his first season, and a "treble" of League, Cup and UEFA Cup (Göteborg beating Hamburg 4-0 in the final) in 1982.

Eriksson's European success led to him being head-hunted by Portuguese club Benfica, and he had a similarly quick impact there, Benfica winning the Portuguese Championship, the Portuguese Cup and finishing runners-up in the UEFA Cup. After a second Championship the following year, Eriksson moved on to Italy, becoming trainer of Roma.

He was not as immediately successful at Roma as he had been before, but he still won a Coppa Italia in 1986.

After a trophyless two years at Fiorentina, Eriksson moved back to Benfica for a second stint in 1989, where he led the Portuguese side to the final of the European Cup (losing to Milan 1-0) in 1990, and another League title in 1991.

In 1992 Eriksson returned to Italy to try his luck again, with Sampdoria, where he managed to win another Coppa Italia in 1994.

In 1997 he agreed to leave Sampdoria at the end of the season to manage English Premiership side Blackburn Rovers however later on that year he went back on his word and opted to stay in Italy and become the new manager at Lazio Eriksson stated personal family reasons for wanting to stay in Italy. Rovers eventually appointed Internazionale coach Roy Hodgson.

Eriksson finally found major success in Italy when he joined Lazio in 1997 (after controversially reneging on a deal to join English club Blackburn Rovers); with Lazio he won the Coppa Italia and the Italian Supercup in 1998 and 2000, the European Cup Winners' Cup (1999 - the very last tournament), and the Serie A title (the Scudetto) in 2000 — only the second time that the Roman club had won the Italian championship in their history. That season had begun with glory in the UEFA Super Cup, winning 1-0 against Manchester United. Bankrolled by Sergio Cragnotti's investment in the team - some £274 million in over 4 seasons - Eriksson amassed trophies on a remarkable scale, and because of this many fans consider him to be Lazio's most successful manager ever.

Following the resignation of England manager Kevin Keegan after a home loss to Germany in October 2000, the Football Association specifically pursued Eriksson as his replacement. Eriksson had initially agreed to take over after the expiration of his contract in summer 2001, but decided to resign his post at Lazio early, and he officially began his England duties in January of that year. Eriksson was the first foreign manager to be appointed coach of the England national team.

Eriksson turned round England's bid for qualification for the 2002 FIFA World Cup, with several crucial wins over lesser opposition before his first real test, England's rematch with Germany in Munich on 1 September 2001. England crushed their long-time rivals 5-1. Despite this England still needed a late equalizer at home to Greece to automatically qualify, and England's initially strong performance in the 2002 World Cup (when in a group stage with Nigeria, Argentina and Sweden) finals culminated in a 2-1 quarter finals loss to 10-man Brazil, who subsequently went on to win the tournament.

After winning their first qualifying match in Slovakia, England drew at home with Macedonia and were then booed off by their fans after losing a friendly to Australia.[9] However England won their next five qualifiers and, needing a point from the last game to qualify, drew 0-0 in Turkey to top the group.

In their first match in the finals, England were winning 1-0 against France after 90 minutes but lost after Zinédine Zidane scored twice in injury time. However, a 3-0 victory over Switzerland and a 4-2 victory over Croatia meant England still qualified for the quarter-finals, where they lost to the hosts Portugal on penalties, but Sol Campbell had a goal controversially disallowed in normal time with the score at 1-1.

On 7 September 2005, Eriksson's England team lost a World Cup qualifying match against Northern Ireland 1-0, the first time that England had lost to that team since 1972. Although it was only Eriksson's first ever defeat in a World Cup or European Championship qualifying match, it brought his position under unprecedented pressure and he was criticized, both by some fans and by BBC commentators, for his lack of charisma and tactical awareness. Criticism continued as England scraped a 1-0 victory over Austria in a game which saw David Beckham controversially sent off. Some of this criticism was answered, however, as England put in a much improved performance, despite the absence of Beckham through suspension and Sol Campbell and Steven Gerrard through injury, in a 2-1 win against Poland.

In 2006, he was recorded saying he would be willing to leave England to manage Aston Villa if England won the World Cup, after being duped into believing that a wealthy Arab would buy the club and wanted him as manager. The wealthy "Arab" was in fact the "Fake Sheikh", an undercover News of the World reporter.

On 23 January, the Football Association announced that Eriksson would leave his job after the 2006 FIFA World Cup, and it was thought that the News of the World allegations played a part in this decision.[10] This was later denied by both parties with Eriksson explaining that there was a prior arrangement to terminate his contract immediately after the World Cup. Following a lengthy period of public and media speculation as to his successor the FA later announced that Steve McClaren, Eriksson's assistant, would take over the reins after the World Cup.

The week before England's first game in Germany, England beat Hungary 3-1 and Jamaica 6-0 at home.

England were unbeaten after the group stage of the tournament, with wins against Paraguay and Trinidad and Tobago, followed by a draw against Sweden. The manner of these results were considered to be far from satisfactory.[11] Eriksson attracted further negative media attention as a consequence.

A David Beckham trademark free kick was enough to see Eriksson's England past Ecuador in a lacklustre 1-0 encounter. However, Eriksson once again fell to nemesis Luiz Felipe Scolari's Portugal. They defeated England 3-1 on penalties with the score 0-0 after extra time, with Beckham lost to injury and Wayne Rooney sent off for stamping on Ricardo Carvalho. The result was Eriksson's third successive exit in a major tournament quarter-final. In his farewell speech, Eriksson wished England well and singled out Rooney for special praise, advising the press not to blame the youngster's dismissal for England's exit.

During his time as England manager Eriksson was constantly in the public eye due to various affairs whilsts dating at the time current partner Nancy Dell'Olio. The women who he had affairs with were; famous Swedish television presenter Ulrika Jonsson and his secretary at the Football Association (FA), Faria Alam, who incidentally also had sexual relations with FA chief executive Mark Palios.

Sven was controversially pipped to the prestigious title of "Durex Man of the Year" by Park Chu-Young in 2006.

In July 2007, virtually a year to the day that he left the England job, Eriksson was confirmed as the new manager of Manchester City after signing a three-year contract (Manchester City's first manager from outside of the UK).[13] His first signing was Italian striker Rolando Bianchi from Reggina for £8.8 million. Bianchi was soon joined at the club by Swiss Under-21 international Gelson Fernandes from Sion, Brazilian midfielder Geovanni from Cruzeiro, and Bulgarian winger Martin Petrov from Atlético Madrid. He also signed Croat Vedran Ćorluka from Dinamo Zagreb, Spaniard Javier Garrido from Real Sociedad and Brazilian Elano from Shakhtar Donetsk. He was successful in his first match, defeating West Ham United 2-0 at Upton Park. During Manchester City's next game, they scored their first home goal in 288 days (since 1 January 2007), to take all three points from a newly promoted Derby County.

On 19 August, Manchester City won the first Manchester derby under Eriksson with a 1-0 win over league champions Manchester United with a goal from one of Sven's summer signings, Geovanni, taking City to the top of the Premier League, with 9 points and having conceded no goals. Manchester City lost their first match on 25 August, a 1-0 loss to Arsenal. On 10 February 2008, Eriksson's Manchester City once again beat Manchester United, this time at Old Trafford, beating them 2-1.

Guiding Manchester City to second place in the Premier League, Eriksson earned himself the Premier League's Manager of the Month award for August. During September 2007, City enjoyed a further two wins at home, whilst winning one point in two matches playing away from home. Meanwhile, Eriksson led the club to the fourth round of the Carling Cup, beating Norwich City at Eastlands by 1-0.

In the last game of the season, Manchester City suffered an 8–1 loss to Middlesbrough F.C.; the biggest defeat of Eriksson's career[14], leaving Manchester City in 9th place in the league, one place away from the UEFA Cup 2008–09 qualifying positions. Manchester City subsequently qualified through the extra place awarded to the Premier League for finishing as the highest placed team (who hadn't already qualified for a European competition) in the UEFA Fair Play League for 2007–08.

Eriksson became the first Manchester City manager since 1969-70 to win both league derby games against Manchester United and also achieved the joint highest Premier League point total in the club's history.

On 2 June 2008, Manchester City confirmed by club statement that they had parted company with Eriksson by "mutual consent", with Eriksson still having two years left on his contract.[15] He was subsequently appointed as manager of Mexico a day later,[16] though he did not formally start the role until after Mexico's World Cup qualifier against Belize on 21 June.[17]

He was supposedly seen at Estadio Olímpico Universitario in Mexico City on 17 July 2008, however it turned out to be an English impersonator, Derek Williams and Eriksson was actually in New York.[18] The false reports regarding the Sven double's activities resulted in a ban from all Mexican football stadiums, however, this was quickly rescinded when Ricardo Ferretti, the Pumas head coach, confirmed that the PR stunt had been an "innocent prank," which they had all been completely convinced by, and that he had "really liked the guy". Williams continued to receive VIP treatment at many Mexico City football stadiums and other venues, and his exploits resulted in a prime time TV special on the following Saturday night which "revealed all" and displayed the high regard within which "Eriksson" is held by the people of Mexico.

On 20 August 2008, he debuted as manager of the Mexican National team in a CONCACAF world cup qualifier versus Honduras. Mexico went on to win 2-1. On the next matches some results were poor, as Mexico tied with Canada and lost to Jamaica and Honduras.

On 11 February 2009, Eriksson was put under further pressure as his side lost 2-0 to the United States. Calls for him to quit or be sacked were heard from the fans while the English club Portsmouth were rumoured to be interested in making him their new manager. This link was strengthened by reports of members from the Portsmouth board flying to Mexico City to discuss contract offers with Eriksson and a possible compensation settlement with the Federación Mexicana de Fútbol Asociación. In early March, Eriksson continued to deny that he would leave Mexico and return to manage Portsmouth, insisting that he would remain and help Mexico qualify for the World Cup. After a 3-1 World Cup Qualifying loss at Honduras, Eriksson was removed as national team coach. Eriksson had only won one of his last seven non-friendly games as manager.

On 21 July 2009, sources disclosed that Eriksson was in talks with English League Two team Notts County to become their director of Football, following that clubs take-over by Middle-East consortium Munto Finance[21]. On 22 July the deal was finalised, with Sven getting a reported, but not confirmed, £2m a year deal. It is believed his contract is based on the future success of the club with a large percentage share holding making up his contract.