By Trevor Stynes
ATLANTA, July 8 (Reuters) - International football has long resisted the foreign coach, especially the major nations who view the World Cup as an expression of national identity, but with Thomas Tuchel's England and Rudi Garcia's Belgium reaching the quarter-finals, the old taboo is being tested again.
At the start of the tournament, 27 countries had non-nationals at the helm, up from nine four years ago, but only German Tuchel and Frenchman Garcia remain in contention to become the first
foreign coach to lift the trophy.
The last time a foreigner led a side to the final was Austrian Ernst Happel whose Netherlands team lost to Argentina in 1978, but England may finally have found the recipe after unsuccessful foreign-coach experiments with Sven-Goran Eriksson and Fabio Capello.
Others — most notably Brazil with Italian Carlo Ancelotti, who was appointed only a year ago to start a major rebuild of the national team — have not yet been able to make the same leap.
Tuchel was not brought in to make a complete overhaul, rather to take England that one step further after Gareth Southgate's reign led to two European Championship finals, and a World Cup semi-final.
He remains on course after battling past DR Congo and Mexico to set up a last-eight clash with Norway who knocked out Brazil in the last 16.
The record five-times champions continue to under-achieve having not reached a final since their 2002 win, and while their bold foreign-coach gamble failed to deliver immediate success, Ancelotti will be given more time.
The Italian signed a contract extension until the next World Cup before this tournament, and the Brazilian federation is hopeful that stability can reap rewards, despite Ancelotti coming in for much criticism.
Belgium, meanwhile, are no strangers to employing non-national coaches, and Spain's Roberto Martinez took them to a third-place finish in 2018. Martinez was not able to replicate that form with Portugal this time around, with his side going out to Spain in the last 16.
Spain are Garcia's quarter-final opponents, and Belgium will be in confident mood against the European champions after their emphatic 4-1 win over co-hosts the United States.
GAMES WITHOUT FRONTIERS
Smaller federations have long relied on outsiders to modernise their game, but there are shifting expectations among major nations, whose reluctance to hire foreigners had kept the statistic frozen for nearly a century.
That resistance reflected how national teams have traditionally been viewed, according to Simon Kuper, author of World Cup Fever, Soccernomics and Football Against the Enemy.
"I think it's partly national pride," Kuper told Reuters.
"It's the idea that at a World Cup, you're not just trying to win as much as you can, you're also trying to display your country's football culture, and that extends to the coach.
"There's a strong belief that it's almost cheating, and it's not authentic to use a foreign coach."
The eight countries who have won the World Cup tended to have large, experienced coaching pools to choose from, and the role is still seen as the pinnacle of a managerial career.
"To give the job to a foreigner is an insult to the leading coaches of your own nation, so that's politically complicated," Kuper said.
"And there's a sense, which was stronger in the past, that we have this unique national way of playing, and no foreign coach can possibly understand."
The modern globalised game, however, has blurred many of the old tactical borders.
"We live in an era where there's an international style, which is a phrase from architecture but now applies in football," Kuper said.
"Largely an international way of playing, which is physical, it's positional changes, it's very fast ball circulation, and it's very organised collective play."
This change is likely to see more countries looking abroad if their current system does not bring success.
"The reason Brazil made the shift is that they realised, like many countries before them, that their national style doesn't work," Kuper said.
"It's a bit like what England did, going with Eriksson and then Capello. It's kind of accepting that you have a dysfunctional national style of playing.
"But that's a very big decision for a federation to make, that we've lost our way and need to lose this soul that people in our country are very attached to."
That difficult decision usually comes in times of trouble.
"If you're a major federation that has failed compared to your standards for a long time, that was the case with England, it's the case with Italy now," Kuper said.
"Also with Brazil, they're in every tournament to win it, so when it's a moment of crisis you will do it.
"And it's not the end of the world, as the case of England shows. Even in a very patriotic football culture, most people will accept."
(Reporting by Trevor Stynes, editing by Julien Pretot and Ed Osmond)
