Overview:
The Haitian Soccer Federation employed Pia Sundhage, the 2012 FIFA Ladies’s World Coach of the 12 months, as the ladies’s crew head coach.
CAP-HAÏTIEN — The Haitian Soccer Federation (FHF) introduced Friday that it had employed Pia Mariane Sundhage as the brand new head coach of the ladies’s crew. Sundhage was among the many greatest ladies’s coaches on the planet within the 2010s, successful the FIFA Ladies’s World Coach of the 12 months award in 2012 and ending second on the World Cup with the U.S. in 2011.
The 66-year-old Swedish additionally coached Brazil, one other powerhouse, in addition to Sweden and Switzerland. Sundhage is likely one of the most achieved coaches to ever take over a Haitian crew, marking a major second in Haitian sports activities.
For the Haitian ladies’s soccer crew, hiring a global girl as its coach is a primary. Different Haitian ladies had coached the crew earlier than, together with former gamers Solange Maître and Yvette Félix, however no overseas girl had ever coached Les Grenadières.
“This appointment is absolutely aligned with the Federation’s strategic plan to construction and professionalize Haitian soccer,” FHF posted in a press release on its Fb account. “It displays a transparent dedication: to lift technical requirements, strengthen a construction of efficiency, and construct sustainable foundations for future generations.”
FHF additionally acknowledged that Sundhage’s mandate contains “mentoring and coaching nationwide coaches; sharing methodologies and technical instruments; step by step integrating native experience inside the workers; and contributing to the sustainable structuring of the Nationwide Technical Directorate.”
“We’re comfortable, now we’re ready for the outcomes. Preserve working so that you guys can add what’s lacking.”
Petitson Lamour, Haitian soccer fan
The ladies’s crew’s degree of play considerably declined after qualifying for the 2023 World Cup. Les Grenadières misplaced all three of their matches within the international event, falling to Denmark 2-0, China 1-0, and England 1-0. Followers closely blamed then-head coach Nicolas Delepine for Haiti’s substandard performances.
In September 2024, the federation changed Delepine with Malou Quignette, a 28-year-old Frenchman who had by no means coached a senior crew earlier than. The crew’s efficiency continued to say no underneath Quignette’s management. He held a 4W-5L-1D file throughout his time with Les Grenadières.
Now that Haiti is underneath the management of a good coach, followers hope the crew will enhance, particularly as a result of the 2027 FIFA Ladies’s World Cup qualifiers have began.
“A coach with Sundhage’s pedigree on the helm of Haiti’s crew is sort of a revolution,” stated Soniel Jean, a fan primarily based in Orlando.
“We’re comfortable, now we’re ready for the outcomes,” Petitson Lamour commented on Fb underneath a post from FHF. “Preserve working so that you guys can add what’s lacking.”
Les Grenadieres began their World Cup qualifiers with a 9-0 win over Belize final December. Now with world celebrity Melchie “Corventina” Dumornay on the sector and Sundhage on the sideline, Haiti is a crew to concern within the the rest of the qualifying stage within the Concacaf area.
Now that her publish is official, the Swedish coach will start work instantly. Les Grenadieres subsequent encounter within the qualifiers might be in opposition to Suriname on March 3.
No info has been disclosed relating to Pia Mariane Sundhage’s wage. Nonetheless, The Haitian Occasions realized from a supply near the FHF that her contract as head coach of the nationwide crew is for one yr— with an choice to renew. “Qualification for the 2027 World Cup in Brazil would robotically set off an extension of her deal,” the supply stated.