Bert van Marwijk likely to be appointed next week

Dutch soccer coach Bert van Marwijk (62) appears likely to take the helm of the Korean national soccer team next week at the earliest.

A Korea Football Association (KFA) official said on Friday, "Negotiations with van Marwijk are in the closing stages and we are coordinating the final details. The KFA plans to announce its appointment of the team manager next week at the earliest."

KFA technical committee chief Lee Yong-soo announced on August 7 that negotiations were under way with van Marwijk on his taking office as Korean national team manager. Lee said the Dutch coach expressed interest in leading the Korean national soccer team. He said negotiations would likely conclude within one week. Van Marwijk also told the Dutch media that although there are Dutch coaches who can work under him, he also wants to work with Korean coaches. He said he was pondering a way to create a desirable combination of Korean and Dutch coaches. Van Marwijk appears to have already decided to take the helm of the Korean national soccer team and started devising a coaching team. One week has passed since Lee talked about the timing. Currently negotiations are going smoothly. It is known that only reviews of details on the annual salary and taxation remain. A KFA official said there is almost no likelihood of the negotiations rupturing at this stage.

Van Marwijk’s annual salary is projected to be in the 19.57 million U.S. dollar range. It is the highest of the foreign managers who led the Korean national soccer team. Guus Hiddink was paid the most, some 1.17 million dollars per year, while Dick Advocaat received 9.78 million dollars, and Humberto Coelho and Pim Verbeek got 685,000 dollars, respectively, while Johannes Bonfrére was paid the least, some 587,000 dollars a year.