• Patrick Kluivert was appointed head coach of Curaçao in 2015

• The Netherlands legend took up the offer because his mother was born on the island

• Following Kluivert’s coaching philosophy, Curaçao won the 2017 Caribbean Cup and advanced to the 2017 Gold Cup

Shilarze Saha Roy For the major part of his playing career, Patrick Kluivert remained an enigma. Despite winning a number of titles at club level, including the UEFA Champions League for Ajax in 1994-95 and La Liga for Barcelona in 1998-99, many still feel that Kluivert didn’t do complete justice to his extraordinary level of talent, that he should have been part of more championship-winning sides. His brilliance for the Netherlands also didn’t yield any trophies, the best results being a fourth-place finish in the 1998 FIFA World Cup and a third-place finish in the 2000 Euros. Once retired in 2008, he took the conventional route of becoming a coach and was soon appointed assistant to the Netherlands’ manager Louis van Gaal in 2012. But Kluivert’s enigmatic ways continued once his stint with Holland ended after the 2014 World Cup. Instead of taking up a lucrative job offer from a European club, Kluivert opted to become the head coach of Curaçao, the birthplace of his mother. “My mother is from the island and I really want to give something back to it — that is why I am here,” Kluivert would famously say to the media after being officially unveiled as Curaçao coach in 2015. The Netherlands’ legend’s single decision changed the course of football on the island of Curaçao and how!

Kluivert was a stylish and imposing striker, a product of the Cruyffian philosophy (the set of footballing principles accredited to Dutch legend Johan Cruyff). He always believed in an attacking brand of football and went on to employ the same tactics in his role as Curaçao’s head coach. The Curaçao side would abandon their ‘reactive style’ and start building their attacks from the back, playing more passes on the ground in a bid to maintain possession, and creating moves by relying on fluid passing and pace. The change wasn’t only on the field. Off the field, too, Kluivert was leaving an impact. Under his coaching, Curaçao could bring in key Dutch players into their set-up, including Leandro Bacuna, Cuco Martina, Felitciano Zschusschen, and Eloy Room, among others who were plying their trade in Europe. With an influx of higher-quality players, the football standard in Curaçao improved by leaps and bounds. The island nation would go on to win six matches, eke out three draws, and lose thrice under the tutelage of Kluivert from March 2015 to June 2016. This would incidentally match the number of wins that the island would notch up from 2011 to 2014, after it became a FIFA member association.

Kluivert’s tenure, though, would end soon as he took up a role as the manager of the Ajax U-19 side in 2016. Curaçao, however, managed his departure smartly. In a bid to extend Kluivert’s philosophy of football, they appointed the Dutch coach’s assistant Remko Bicentini as their manager. Bicentini built on the groundwork laid by Kluivert and it eventually resulted in Curaçao winning the 2017 Caribbean Cup and advancing to the 2017 Gold Cup, their first major tournament as an autonomous country. It was a great achievement, considering that the side failed to win a single match and finished at the bottom of their group in the 2014 edition of the tournament. This historic triumph also saw Curaçao’s FIFA ranking jump to an all-time high of 68 from 183. Even though Kluivert left the Caribbean shores, he still remained involved in the Curaçao set-up. First, he served as an advisor and later became interim manager of the side in 2021 when his compatriot Guus Hiddink was recovering from Covid-19. Today, the side is fancying their chances of qualifying for the 2026 World Cup with FIFA expanding the field to 48 countries. That they could dream the impossible dream is due to Kluivert’s football philosophy.