Soon after the news broke last month that Fred Rutten would lead Curaçao at the World Cup, he received a text from one of the players. “Hey boss, welcome to the family,” read the message from the goalkeeper Eloy Room. It was a warm greeting for the coach called in to replace Dick Advocaat, who had led the small island to that historic qualification but stepped down to be with his ill daughter.
Rutten’s appointment may have been a surprise to the outside world – he has not held a coaching role for almost three years and has never led a national team – but his appointment did not come out of the blue.
The Curaçao football federation had first approached him before the qualifiers, in 2023. Although the Dutchman was enthusiastic, he could not take the position because of medical issues but recommended Advocaat, who achieved what seemed impossible by guiding The Blue Wave to the World Cup. When Advocaat stepped away, he suggested Rutten and the federation acted quickly on his advice.
Rutten says the backdrop to Advocaat’s departure is dreadful but that his compatriot’s blessing to take over makes it easier. “I’m sticking to Dick’s line, with the direction he has taken. It would be very strange if a new coach came in and suddenly decided to take a completely different path. My predecessor is simply a very capable man.”
The two met after Rutten’s appointment to discuss details. “He passed everything on perfectly,” Rutten says. It helps that Rutten has worked with several of the players, including Room at Vitesse and Armando Obispo, Jürgen Locadia and Shurandy Sambo at PSV.
Curaçao will become the smallest nation to play at a World Cup, in population (about 156,000) and land area (171 sq miles) and Rutten is looking forward to the challenge. “The excitement is already there,” the 63-year-old says. “You wake up with it and you go to bed with it.” Sadly for Rutten, his first game in charge ended in a 2-0 defeat to China at the
Accor Stadium in Sydney on Friday.
With Curaçao part of the kingdom of the Netherlands, where many of the squad were born, the federation’s almost exclusive use of Dutch coaches for more than 10 years is no shock. The technical director, Khalid Sinouh, was a reserve goalkeeper under Rutten at PSV in 2011-12 and put him forward.
At PSV, where Rutten assisted Guus Hiddink until 2006 after heading up the academy, he gained insight into letting players express themselves. “We had a nice mix of nationalities, with players from Brazil and Peru listening to music and dancing before the game. I asked Guus whether we had to stop them to focus on the match, but Guus, who had already worked in several countries, just said to let them do their thing. And once they came out for the warming-up, they were fully switched on for the game. That was really eye-opening, something I’ve taken with me.”
Rutten, who has coached in Germany, the UAE, Israel and Belgium, is telling his story in the lobby of a hotel in Enschede, the city he moved to at 15 to play for Twente. It was a difficult time, his father having just died, but he became a highly respected one-club man there, earning one Netherlands cap, in 1988. The centre-back narrowly missed out that year on a place in the squad for the European Championship, which the Netherlands won.
After his playing days, Rutten became a Twente assistant before taking over as manager in 1999. A Dutch Cup final victory over PSV on penalties two years later came after he provided his players with an unusual source of inspiration.
“Around 35,000 of our fans made their way to De Kuip in Rotterdam, something I wanted to show the players,” says Rutten, so he and his staff collaborated with the TV station RTV Oost to film the scenes on matchday and fly the footage by helicopter to the team hotel. “You could hear the helicopter arriving, with their team quickly handing over a videotape capturing the atmosphere among fans travelling by bus from the east of Holland. I gathered the players, put the tape into the recorder and said: ‘Have a look at this.’ I wanted them to feel what they were playing for. I left the room and it was completely silent.”
Twente’s trophy was their first in 24 years and during a second spell there, from 2006-08, Rutten guided the club to the Champions League qualifiers. Time in between at PSV with Hiddink was invaluable, he says. “The players knew I had the head coach’s confidence. Guus even took charge of Australia during the international breaks at some point, while training and everything just carried on.”
Hiddink’s approach aligned with Rutten’s, with man-management key. It has earned Rutten the respect of many players, including Patrick van Aanholt, who revealed Rutten was crucial in keeping his career on track during a tough period, when the left-back was on loan at Vitesse from Chelsea.
There was speculation at the time that Chelsea wielded influence at the Arnhem club. Rutten admits Chelsea expected their loan players to play, but says he was not forced to use them. “Everyone knows there was a link, but I let the technical director deal with that. I went to London once to visit Marina [Granovskaia, a Chelsea director at the time].”
Rutten visited London again when offered the Charlton job by Roland Duchâtelet – “After watching a few of their matches, I realised there was not much to gain” – and four years ago there was another opportunity to come to England, when Erik ten Hag asked him to be his assistant at Manchester United. “I thought about it … but I wanted to see my family regularly and I chose that life. If I were 10 years younger, though, I would have definitely done it.”
Rutten went to PSV instead, for a third time, to assist Ruud van Nistelrooy, winning the Dutch Cup and overseeing the final game of the 2022-23 season after Van Nistelrooy stepped down.
In recent years Rutten has been involved as a board adviser at NEC, having a say in squad composition and staff recruitment at a club who reached this season’s Dutch Cup final and sit third in the Eredivisie. NEC gave him permission to take the Curaçao job and World Cup games against Germany, Côte d’Ivoire and Ecuador lie ahead.
“We have the ambition to surprise,” Rutten says. “And with three games, you have three chances. If Leicester City can win the Premier League, then you know something is possible and at World Cups there are always surprises.”
