Carlos Queiroz

Carlos Manuel Brito Leal de Queiroz (born 1 March 1953) is a Portuguese football manager.

He moved to Portugal following Portugal's Carnation Revolution on 25 April 1974, and Mozambique's declaration of independence in 1975.

Queiroz is a graduate of the University of Lisbon.

In 1984, Queiroz was appointed as assistant manager of Estoril-Praia.

He coached the Portuguese under-20 side to two FIFA World Youth Championship wins, in the 1989 and 1991 tournaments.

After that, Queiroz was appointed senior national team coach in 1991.

He had a record of 14 wins in 31 matches.

Afterwards, he went on to manage the Portuguese Primeira Divisão team Sporting CP in 1994.

He subsequently coached the NY/NJ MetroStars in the United States and the Japanese team, Nagoya Grampus Eight.

In between, he found time to author the Q-Report, detailing plans to professionalize the development of footballers in the United States.

In 1998, he authored the Q-Report, which detailed plans to enhance footballer development in the United States.

Queiroz returned to coaching national teams in 1999, when he took the job as head coach of the United Arab Emirates, before becoming head coach of South Africa in 2000.

Queiroz was part of FIFA XI coaching staff, alongside Brazilian Carlos Alberto Parreira, in a humanitarian friendly match played in war-torn Sarajevo against Bosnia and Herzegovina on 25 April 2000.

He has served as the manager of his native Portugal's national team, the United Arab Emirates, South Africa, Iran, Colombia, Egypt and Qatar, leading South Africa (2002), Portugal (2010) and Iran (2014, 2018, and 2022) to the FIFA World Cup.

At club level, he has also managed Sporting CP, the New York/New Jersey Metrostars in Major League Soccer and Spanish club Real Madrid.

He also had two spells as Alex Ferguson's assistant manager at English club Manchester United.

Queiroz has won several awards as a coach at junior levels, and has been successful at senior and club levels, mainly as Alex Ferguson's assistant manager.

Under Queiroz, South Africa qualified for the 2002 FIFA World Cup, but Queiroz resigned in March 2002 before the finals, after falling out with the South African Football Association.

Queiroz became a coach at English club Manchester United in June 2002.

He began his work at the start of the 2002–03 season, working alongside Alex Ferguson, who had gone without an assistant manager since the departure of Steve McClaren in the middle of 2001.

Queiroz's position at Manchester United as assistant manager attracted the attention of Real Madrid, who wanted Queiroz as their manager to replace departing manager Vicente del Bosque in the summer of 2003.

It was an opportunity to work with FIFA World Player of the Year award winners Zinedine Zidane, Ronaldo and Luís Figo, an opportunity that Queiroz felt unable to turn down.

He was appointed on a two-year contract, only a week after the arrival of Manchester United player David Beckham.

In the same summer, Real Madrid lost veteran defender Fernando Hierro, defensive midfielder Claude Makélélé and striker Fernando Morientes.

Real Madrid got off to a good start of the 2003–04 season, defeating Mallorca in the Supercopa de España.

By mid-season, the team topped the La Liga table and was in contention for the Copa del Rey and the UEFA Champions League trophies.

However, they lost their final five matches and finished in fourth place, with Valencia winning the title.

They lost the Copa del Rey final to Real Zaragoza and were eliminated from the Champions League in the quarter-finals by Morientes's new team Monaco, after a 4–2 first leg win, ending the season with the Supercopa de España as the only trophy won, the first time in five years without a major trophy.

Some sources noted the effect of his absence on the club's 2003–04 season, in which they came third in the league and exited early from the Champions League.

Following ten months at the Santiago Bernabéu, Queiroz was sacked in May 2004.

Queiroz returned to United as Ferguson's assistant in June 2004.

Queiroz was linked with managerial roles with Portuguese side Benfica and the United States national team in 2006, but he remained with Manchester United to help them win the Premier League in 2007.

Queiroz was often seen conducting interviews with BBC programmes, such as Match of the Day, as at the time Alex Ferguson refused to speak with the BBC after allegations by the BBC's Panorama programme that Ferguson's younger son Jason and Portsmouth manager Harry Redknapp had been involved in corruption regarding cuts in transfer fees.

Some of Queiroz's post-match opinions on refereeing were controversial.

Queiroz is the longest-serving manager in the history of the Iran national team, serving for almost eight years between 2011 and 2019.

He returned to the role for Iran's 2022 World Cup campaign.

He is the only manager in the country's history to lead them at three consecutive World Cups.

Born in Nampula, Portuguese Mozambique, to Portuguese parents, Queiroz had an undistinguished professional career as a footballer, playing as a goalkeeper in Mozambique before turning to management.

In his 2014 autobiography, United captain Roy Keane stated that an argument with Queiroz about loyalty was one of the reasons why the Irishman quit the club in 2005.

Keane said during ITV's coverage of the 2018 FIFA World Cup that "one of my big regrets is that I probably should have ripped his head off".