For the players who trained under him for more than a year, Louis van Gaal was a man of rules and a disciplinarian who’d be dressed in a loose tracksuit, was always close to blowing his top and whose raised eyebrow would often mean trouble for someone.
Beneath the stern exterior, what they did not see was a 71-year-old in his most vulnerable state – a man who had a catheter and a colostomy bag fitted under the ill-fitting tracksuit, and who would sneak out at night, either after training or a World Cup qualifying match, to go to the hospital.
What they did not know was Van Gaal was suffering from an aggressive form of prostate cancer and had undergone 25 chemotherapy sessions, some even after he took charge of the Dutch side in August 2021.
As the players gave it all on the pitch to ensure the Netherlands returned to the stage where they belong – the World Cup – after failing to qualify four years ago, their coach was battling for his life. Van Gaal never mentioned a word of any of this to the players. He spoke about it for the first time only after the Netherlands qualified for the World Cup, and when the doctors assured him that the treatment was successful.
Last week, in an interview with the Dutch newspaper NRC, Van Gaal said the reason he hid his illness was to ensure the players focussed on the game and 'not worry about their trainer's illness.' There was another reason, which gave a glimpse into Van Gaal's personality. “Man is weak by nature. I am an exception,” he told the NRC.
It was typical Van Gaal – he'd never hide his emotions but not reveal his vulnerabilities either. “I'm made of a little bit of iron,” he'd once said in a press conference after taking charge as the Manchester United boss. “So I have a shield, an iron shield.”
It was a statement by a man devoid of any insecurity and who had loads of self-confidence, built on the back of a glorious coaching career that has seen him win trophies with Ajax, Barcelona, AZ Alkmaar, Bayern Munich and Manchester United.
He may longer be a path-breaking coach, a great thinker of the sport that he was, say, until a decade ago. But Van Gaal – who has a suite name after him at a posh five-star hotel in the Dutch city of Noordwijk (former Netherlands coaches Bert van Marwijk, Guus Hiddink and Dick Advocaat, too, have suites named after them at this hotel but Van Gaal insists his is the 'best and most popular') – remains one of the most compelling figures in football.
When Ronald Koeman quit as the Netherlands coach two years ago to take charge of Barcelona, captain Virgil van Dijk and other influential players in the squad, including Memphis Depay and Georginio Wijnaldum, told the national federation to appoint a coach was a 'people manager who would give players a lot of freedom', the NRC reported.
The KNVB – the Dutch federation – turned to Frank de Boer, a lifelong student of Van Gaal's methods, but his stint quickly turned into a disappointment after he was removed after the Netherlands were eliminated in the Round of 16 of the Euros last year.
At this point, Van Gaal had retired from football. He was, in his own words, a 'pensioner'. He wasn't a 'people manager' that the players wanted as well. Anything but that, in fact. He didn't care for reputations, made deep tactical assessments of his team and the rivals, and wasn't afraid to publicly admonish his players if needed, as was the case with Wijnaldum after he joined the training camp being 'out of shape'.
Yet, there was little resistance when KNVB chose him as a coach, oblivious to the fact that he was diagnosed with cancer. For Van Gaal, it was a chance to redeem himself. For all he'd achieved at the club level, his two previous stints with the Dutch side weren't successful.
His first term ended in a fiasco after the Netherlands failed to qualify for the 2002 World Cup in South Korea and Japan. In his second attempt, at the 2014 World Cup in Brazil, the Netherlands defied expectations by reaching the semifinals but with the kind of talent that was at his disposal, the inability to reach the final was seen as a failure of sorts.
This, now, is his last dance.
His record since taking over the team while battling cancer simultaneously is rather impressive – the Netherlands have played 15 games, won 11 and drawn four, and scored 41 goals in the process. His use of wing-backs and the mouthwatering possibility of playing Luuk de Jong, Wout Weghorst and Vincent Janssen – if Van Gaal starts with his pet 4-3-3 formation – could spell trouble for the opponents, especially in the group stage where the Dutch are paired up with Qatar, Ecuador and Senegal, against whom they open their campaign on Monday.
Despite almost half a decade of underachieving, Van Gaal believes the Netherlands have a 'great chance' of becoming world champions.
Old and fragile he may be, but his confidence isn't shaken