Football’s best up-and-coming managers: Will Still and his (pro) licence to thrill

This is the fifth article in a six-part series looking at some of European football’s most innovative up-and-coming managers.

Part one on Thiago Motta is here, part two on Kieran McKenna is here, part three on Paolo Fonseca is here and part four on Garcia Pimienta is here.

Very little in football is truly distillable into 240 characters, but that is exactly what happened to Will Still last season.

You probably saw the deluge of social media posts containing roughly these words in roughly this order:

Will Still has led Reims to an 18-game unbeaten run in all competitions. At 30 years old, he’s the youngest manager in Europe’s top five leagues. Reims pay a £22,000 fine each time Still manages because he doesn’t have his UEFA Pro licence.

Newsworthy? Absolutely. The youngest head coach in Europe’s top five leagues not sinking when thrown in at the deep end is impressive. Headlines about him playing Football Manager as a youngster were way less than he deserved.

Still’s meme-ification painted him as a bit of a charlatan. In reality, he is at the forefront of an emerging generation of young English head coaches. Born in Belgium to English parents, he describes England as home. What makes him stand out, though, is the fact he worked his way into football via academia.

Still is a football coaching graduate of Myerscough College in Lancashire, and without a professional playing career, worked his way into the game as a performance analyst. Assistant coach roles followed: at Lierse, Belgian youth teams, Beerschot and Reims, to Standard Liege and then back to Reims.

Still in charge of Beerschot in 2021 (Sebastien Smets / Photonews via Getty Images)

It is a rich, varied background, which started professionally in Still’s early 20s. Legislation has been the only thing holding him back. Three successful interim coaching spells, all in his 20s, are no fluke. Still has adapted under pressure, in different cultures and environments — which comes naturally to him anyway.

The first was with Lierse in 2017-18, first taking over as a 24-year-old, in Belgium’s second tier. The club were second-bottom with one win from 11 and with the league’s worst defence. Under Still’s back-to-basics approach, they won seven from eight, six by a single goal. Without his UEFA ‘A’ licence, he could not legally be in charge for more than 60 days — Still duly returned to an assistant role in late 2017, before joining Beerschot after Lierse went bankrupt.

His interim spell at Beerschot came in early 2021, at the end of his three years there. He was assistant when they were promoted to the Belgian top flight, then took charge after Hernan Losada left for MLS in January. Beerschot were flying, winning the ‘opening tournament’ (Belgium’s top tier operates a two-part South American-style apertura and clausura system).

Beerschot scored (22) more than they conceded (20) in 15 games under Still, but lost (seven) more than they won (six). He steadied the ship, though. The club was only founded in 2013 and this was their first top-flight season — Still, at 28, was the youngest first-division coach in Belgian league history. Five of the team’s seven losses were by a single goal. Even so, Beerschot replaced Still, citing ‘second season syndrome’ and the need for a more experienced head coach.

It gave him something to prove. He opted against returning to Beerschot as an assistant and instead became Oscar Garcia’s assistant at Reims. Still left after four months, in October 2021. He was in the process of completing his Pro Licence in Belgium, so taking a job at Standard Liege was better logistically. He had to commute twice weekly to Belgium otherwise. Still finished the season with Liege, but Reims head coach Oscar Garcia wanted him back.

But Still’s ability to work under adversity was soon tested again. Garcia’s daughter was battling cancer, so he was away from the training ground a lot. It coincided with Reims’ poor start, with only one win and seven points from their opening nine games. That form saw Garcia sacked.

Still had a clause in his contract: Reims could fire him with Garcia because it had been the head coach who had brought him back to Reims, not the club. Instead, they made the Englishman interim boss. His first game? Reims’ 0-0 draw against the might of Paris Saint-Germain in early October.

The context: PSG were in between Champions League games, so rotated their team. Kylian Mbappe started but Neymar and Achraf Hakimi were on the bench. Lionel Messi was not involved. Sergio Ramos was sent off before half-time. Regardless, Still’s side were the first team to keep a clean sheet against PSG all season.

Still was conscious of mixing up Reims’ out-of-possession approach. He was prepared to cede possession but wanted to press, as sitting off would inevitably lead to conceding. PSG only managed three shots on target, their fewest in a game at that stage of the season.

Reims defended in a 5-3-2 mid-block, keeping a high defensive line, but pressed PSG’s 4-3-3 man-for-man in their half. The focus: to bait passes wide and trap them there.

In this example, centre-back Yunis Abdelhamid tracks PSG No 9 Pablo Sarabia into his own third. PSG are then locked in their own half for almost a minute until Abdelhamid fouls Nordi Mukiele.

Reims drop into their compact 5-3-2 from the free kick. The two No 9s mark PSG’s pivot while Reims’ wing-backs jump to press their full-backs. The central midfielders, meanwhile, man-mark PSG’s No 8s.

After his success against PSG, Still was handed official interim charge of the club for five games before the season paused for the 2022 World Cup. Three wins and two draws featured significant home wins over Nantes and Auxerre, both below Reims when Still took over. There was also a clean sheet away to Lorient, who had made a flying start. All of which meant Reims were 11th and five points clear of the relegation zone during the World Cup.

GO DEEPER

The restoration of Reims: The real story of Will Still and the Ligue 1 side

By February, the unbeaten run had stretched to 17 games — the most by a head coach at the start of their Ligue 1 career. After Tito Vilanova (18 games with Barcelona in 2012-13), Still became only the second head coach since 2000 to go this many games without defeat in their debut season in Europe’s top five leagues.

Reims play effervescently — fitting for a team from France’s Champagne region. Their style has earned results in big away games, including two draws at the Parc des Princes, which witnessed an unbeaten-run-maintaining last-minute equaliser there last season. They are the only team to win away to Lille this season and drew there in 2022-23 as well. Still has also masterminded 1-0 and 3-1 wins at the Stade Louis II in Monaco.

(Francois Nascimbeni/AFP via Getty Images)

Out of possession, Reims are aggressive. They ranked fourth in Ligue 1 last season for fouls and final-third tackles, often pressing man-for-man. Reims were also fourth for opposition shots blocked, a sign of a team that can defend in different ways. Only Lens (15) bettered their 14 clean sheets.

In attack, they can be direct, hitting wide areas early and favouring crosses. Still calls his No 8s “invasion players” who have to flood the box. This season they are among Ligue 1’s top four for successful open-play crosses, switches and take-ons leading to shots. As in 2022-23, they have racked up the most offsides, prepared to play in-behind on transition to a channel-chasing No 9.

That has been Mohamed Daramy this season, replacing on-loan Folarin Balogun from 2022-23. Balogun hit 21 goals (including six penalties), the most by a Reims player in a Ligue 1 campaign this century.

“Will’s fantastic. I couldn’t have asked for anything better when I was coming out here,” Balogun told BeIN Sports last season. “He’s taken that role (head coach, from assistant) with so much ease, like he’s been doing it forever”.

Things have not been as watertight this season, with only six clean sheets and a mid-table defence (goals conceded up from 0.89/game last season to 1.3 this campaign).

Even so, Reims are still punching above their weight. They are ninth on 38 points, but as close to sixth place Lens (42 points) as 10th place Lyon (34 points). End the season well and a second European campaign this century beckons, outstanding for a club with only the 12th-highest budget in Ligue 1. Fate is in their hands: Nice, Marseille and Rennes (all between fifth and eighth) have to travel to Stade Auguste-Delaune.

Reims’s ClubElo chart, a predictive estimation of team strength based on results, shows their upward trajectory under Still.

Regardless of their finish this season, Still may not be around much longer. He is increasingly linked to jobs in England’s second tier. Still, a West Ham fan, would be an exciting curveball choice should David Moyes depart.

“I want to come home. I’ve been abroad all my life and I’ve been working in an environment that isn’t quite mine,” he told The Athletic in an interview this season. “I would work for a Championship team without a problem,” he says, providing they are open, honest and ambitious. Still’s Reims side, structurally sound, cross-heavy and prepared to be physical, with some quality technicians, would not look out of place in the EFL.

Neither would Still himself, with the Championship having eight 30-something managers and clubs increasingly taking a chance on managers with unique career paths rather than ‘names’ who have been in management for decades.

Still speaks thoughtfully and articulately — unsurprising given his fluency in English, French and Flemish: “What I’ve now understood, I’ve now realised, is how important people are. And how important finding the right place to be is going to be for my career. And people who understand the way I work because I’m a bit different. I’m a bit odd sometimes.”

GO DEEPER

'Football was just what we did. Us three against the world' - an evening in Reims with the Brothers Still

He considers himself someone who acts instinctually more than analytically. The best example was turning down the assistant coach role to Vincent Kompany at Anderlecht. He did not see himself fitting in and benefiting the club.

His departure from Reims might be accelerated by their transfer policy, at odds with Still’s ambition. “Every six months to a year, you just have to renew the whole squad and the whole team,” said Still. “And that’s what happened again here in January. We sold our best player and we’re now looking to find a new balance.”

That was Azor Matusiwa, who Still says “gave us the whole balance in midfield”, to Rennes. Reims were seven points and four places above them at that point. Now, Rennes are eighth, one point and one place above Reims.

They have made more than they have spent in transfer fees in the past two seasons. As per Transfermarkt, since 2018-19, when they returned to Ligue 1, they have made €173.6million (£149m), but only spent €137.8million (£118m).

There is clearly mutual respect between Still and Reims, but he has perhaps always been slightly too ambitious — shown by his previous move to Liege — for their liking. A move to another major European league might make sense for both parties.

But Still does not need to rush. This is, technically, his first full season of management, though he has already taken charge of over 80 games in his curious but compelling career. If he coaches for each of the next eight seasons, he will have close to, or just over, 400 games by the time he turns 40.

He says he has “never really had a career plan”. So far that seems to be working out just fine.

(Top photo: Jean Catuffe via Getty Images)