Arsenal legend Steve Bould has secured a return to the dugout after being appointed head coach of Belgian side Lommel SK.
Bought by City Football Group in 2020, Lommel SK play their football in Belgium’s second tier and operates as a feeder club to Manchester City.
In addition to the Premier League champions, City Football Group (78% owned by Abu Dhabi United Group) also operates or has a vested interest in Melbourne City FC, Montevideo City Torque, New York City FC, Mumbai City FC, Girona FC, Sichuan Jiuniu, Yokohama F.Marinos and Troyes.
On taking up his new job, Bould said: “I am delighted to join Lommel SK within City Football Group and to work with such a talented group of players. It is a great time to join the club and to be part of an exciting journey in the years to come.”
After 10 years as a player at Arsenal, Bould returned to the club in 2001 to work with the club’s youngsters and led them to Premier Academy titles in 2008/09 and 2009/10 and an FA Youth Cup in 2008/09.
In 2012, he replaced Pat Rice as Arsene Wenger’s assistant and held the job for seven seasons before taking over Freddie Ljungberg’s duties with the under-23s.
Bould eventually left the club last summer as Per Mertesacker and Mikel Arteta continued a reshaping of the Arsenal Academy.
While taking up a gig on the Death Star isn’t something we’d advise anyone to do, it’s good to see Steve returning to the game he’s served for so long.
Great guy and player, truly a legend. Did well under Wenger, hope he can do the same as the head coach in Belgium.
It will be interesting to see whether these giant conglomerate groups of football clubs become the next evolution in ownership.
If I’m a billionaire owner and/ or nation state, what better way to consolidate power across the football landscape than to own teams across multiple FAs. Cynically (/ realistically), the ‘City Group’ can apply pressure to nine different footballing authorities. None of those associations are going to want their investment to dry up, and so they could and likely do act as a giant funnel into FIFA’s wholly corrupt system.
I think sportswashing creates an important difference between “normal” billionaire owners and entities like this one. The owners of City are unintersted in profits; they want people to learn to feel that the UAE is just a normal country, a country that is part of the same sporting community as England or France, or Denmark, etc. That’s precisely why it makes sense for them to have a sporting presence in many countries. This isn’t like Watford, shuffling players and managers around. The best example of sportswashing, for me, is the one that succeeded long ago so well that we never… Read more »
It’ll be interesting to see how he does, he’s never impressed me as a coach, either with Wenger or the youth set up.
3 ‘premier’ leagues, 2 FA cups, 1 league cup, 1 Cup Winners cup, with a number of close misses on titles & finals whats not to love this Arsenal legend, he surprisingly only scored 5 goals for us but his (flicks from near post) goals assist from corners were legendary, wishing Bouldy success in his new adventure
Man City – funded by Abu Dhabi = bad
Phil Mickelson & Dustin Johnson – funded by Saudi Arabia = bad
Newcastle United – funded by Saudi Arabia = bad
Messi – ambassador for Saudi Arabia = bad
Steve Bould – paid by Abu Dhabi = Pass?
Have I got that right? It was blogs recently lamenting City winning the title and what a poor taste it left in his mouth. Should we not say the same about this appointment? Andrew A – do you have a contrasting opinion or thoughts on this?