Hiddink mania takes off as business and political leaders take note

For a year or so, it seemed that Sven Goran Eriksson might become the model for the football coach as management guru: methodical, detached, icily calm. Since last Friday in Shizuoka, however, sitting sipping water while your business collapses when faced with a superior competitor suddenly seems a less sensible strategy. No, there is only one role model now, and the secrets of his success will soon be in an airport bookshop near you.

Here are some headlines from Seoul newspapers in the past two days alone: "Hiddink syndrome sweeps Korea", "Korea to adopt Hiddink-style approach for attacking investment", and "Korean politics looking for Hiddink-like coach". The first book, of many, is already out. It is called: CEO Hiddink: Domination of the Game, and explains how the great man's management philosophy can be adapted by the business community. A typical chapter heading is: You Will Know Everything When The Time Comes (Setting a Vision and a Goal).

Guus Hiddink, 55, football coach, is not so much the flavour of the month as the staple diet. Chairmen from companies like Samsung and the Hyundai motor group have instructed their executives to study his methods, and the government minister for commerce, industry and energy has commended his man-management as a model for every firm, large and small.

Last weekend, as Spain went the way of Poland, Portugal and Italy, a university professor likened him to "an eminent physician" healing Korean football. Tour packages are now available to the Netherlands, whose main selling point is a visit to the house where Hiddink was born.

Startling as the level of this veneration may be, the reasons behind it are not difficult to appreciate. At the time that he succeeded Huh Jung-Moo as the South Korean coach in January last year, the country's football was at a low ebb, following failures at the Sydney Olympics and the 2000 Asian Games. Confident after successful periods with PSV Eindhoven (European Cup winners) and the Dutch national team (semi-finalists at France '98), he staked everything on a transformation of the Korean game.

Greater physical fitness became a priority and a more egalitarian approach was introduced in place of the inbred culture of seniority, under which younger players automatically deferred to their elders. He also used unfamiliar systems, like 3-4-3 and 4-3-3, and tried to make players more flexible. The striker Ahn Jung-Hwan, nowa celebrity second only to Hiddink himself, has praised a hard taskmaster for pushing him relentlessly and developing his game.

Hiddink was naturally judged from the start on the team's results, initially unspectacular and which have made the subsequent success all the more remarkable. "In the beginning, it was chaos," he recently admitted.

At last summer's Confederations Cup, a dress rehearsal for the World Cup, the Koreans scraped past Australia and Mexico but only after being beaten 5-0 by France.

But Hiddink had his eye on the longer term. His employers kept faith in him, and were rewarded from the start of this year over the course of a programme of friendlies against seasoned European opposition meant to toughen up the squad.

"It is all very well playing second and third-rate teams, but you don't learn anything," the coach claimed. He also had the squad together for almost three months in the run-up to the World Cup. "I'm working like a club manager," he said during that period, enjoying the luxury of having had the domestic K-League suspended last December.

Today's game will be the Koreans' 21st international this year. The dark-suited figure prowling their technical area will work even harder than for the previous 20 in all aspects of the manager's job.

In victory over Spain on Saturday, his first thought was to commiserate with the distraught opposing players he had once coached at Real Madrid, Valencia and Real Betis. Then he sat through a series of interviews in whichever was the most appropriate of his five languages.

Whatever the outcome of the semi-final, there will be few recriminations in Korea, not just out of gratitude but because the nation is so desperate for him to sign a new contract. Given the number of options open – a return to PSV is just one – that seems unlikely.

How much further could even this coach take a team as essentially limited as the Koreans, when expectations have soared so high? Should a career as a management consultant appeal, however...