Stuart Baxter

Stuart Baxter

Personal information
Full name	Stuart William Baxter
Date of birth	(1953-08-16) 16 August 1953
Place of birth	Wolverhampton, England, United Kingdom
Position(s)	Midfielder
Youth career
1971–1973	Preston North End
Senior career*
Years	Team	Apps	(Gls)
1973–1975	Preston North End	41	(25)
1975	Morecambe	1	(0)
1975	Dundee United	0	(0)
1976–1977	Stockport County	4	(1)
1978–1979	South Melbourne FC	50	(22)
1981	Helsingborgs IF	16	(7)
1982	South Melbourne FC	20	(11)
1983	San Diego Sockers	27	(12)
1983–1984	Örebro SK	41	(19)
Total		200	(96)
Managerial career
1985	Örebro SK
1986	IF Skarp
1987	Vitória Setubal
1988–1991	Halmstads BK
1992–1994	Sanfrecce Hiroshima
1995–1997	Vissel Kobe
1998–2000	AIK
2001	Lyn
2002–2004	England Under-19
2004–2005	South Africa
2006	Vissel Kobe
2006–2007	Helsingborgs IF
2008–2010	Finland
2012–2015	Kaizer Chiefs
201–2016	Gençlerbirliği
2016	AIK
*Club domestic league appearances and goals

Stuart Baxter (born 16 August 1953 in Wolverhampton) is a Scottish former football player and a manager. During his years as a professional player he played for a number of clubs in England, Scotland, Australia, Sweden and in the United States. He has previously managed clubs in Sweden, Norway, Portugal and Japan as well as managing the national teams of South Africa, Finland and the England under-19 national football team.

Early life

Baxter, who has a Scottish father and an English mother, was born in Wolverhampton.

Playing career

Baxter began his playing career with Preston North End in 1973. He joined Scottish club Dundee United in October 1975, but was released the following month after playing only for the reserve team. He then returned to England with Stockport County. Baxter then moved to Australia, Sweden and the United States respectively with South Melbourne FC, Helsingborgs IF and San Diego Sockers. His playing career ended in 1983.

Coaching career

Early coaching career in Scandinavia and Japan

Baxter returned to Scandinavia to begin his coaching career; he worked with Örebro SK's youth team. In 1986, he was appointed manager of minor Norwegian side Idrettsforeningen Skarp. The following year he landed a larger managerial role with Portuguese team Vitória de Setúbal before returning to Sweden for a three-year stint at Halmstads BK between 1988 and 1991. In his first year with Halmstad he guided them to promotion to the Allsvenskan but the club was relegated at the end of his tenure. Baxter moved to Japan to first coach Sanfrecce Hiroshima, between 1992 and 1994, and then Vissel Kobe, in 1997. He took over as manager of Kobe only days after an earthquake caused devastation in the city and spent two weeks living in a makeshift caravan in the Club carpark.

AIK

In 1998, Baxter was bought back to Sweden by AIK, where he guided them to the Swedish championship. Having qualified for the UEFA Champions League, Baxter took AIK into the group stages where the Swedish champions played against some of Europe's largest teams, such as FC Barcelona, Arsenal and Fiorentina. Unsurprisingly, AIK finished bottom of the group. After two years, he moved to Norwegian side Lyn Oslo.

England Under-19, South Africa, Return to Japan and Scandinavia

Baxter was hired by the Football Association to coach the England Under-19 team in 2002. After two years, he was hired as South Africa's manager. By autumn 2005, he quit this role having failed to qualify for the 2006 World Cup. He later had another short spell at Vissel Kobe before moving back to Helsingborg, this time as manager in 2006. He took the Swedish side past the group stages of the UEFA Cup in 2007 but he resigned at the end of the year.

Finland

At the beginning of 2008, Baxter was appointed manager of Finland on a two-year contract. In January 2009 it was announced that he has signed an extended contract that will keep him in charge of the Finland team through the 2012 European Championships campaign.

In June 2010 Baxter was strongly linked with a possible director of football position at Celtic to work alongside new manager Neil Lennon, however these hopes came to nothing as Celtic were unable to agree a settlement for Baxter's services with the Football Association of Finland.

During the autumn of 2010, The Finland national team lost important matches against Moldova and Hungary, which lead to widespread hopes for Baxter's resignation made public by the National Team Supporters, the media and the country's leading football pundits. It turned out, too, that Baxter had failed to establish communicative relationships with some of the key players in the squad, favouring certain players instead. Baxter, however, refused to resign, attacking journalists for not understanding football well enough in order to evaluate his performance as a manager. The Football Association of Finland did not sack Baxter either, citing, e.g., financial reasons. The Finland national team's position in FIFA World Rankings has sunk from 33 to 86 under Baxter's guidance On November 2010, The Football Association of Finland revealed that Baxter would no longer continue in his job as a manager of the national team.

Kaizer Chiefs

On 7 May 2012 Baxter was announced as the new manager of South African club, Kaizer Chiefs. He started his duties in June 2012. In the first season under his management, Amakhosi completed the double, finishing first in the 2012–13 Premier Soccer League and defeating Supersport United 1–0 to win the Nedbank Cup.

The 2013–14 South African Premier Division campaign ended in disappointment with the soweto based side failing to register a trophy despite occupying the top position in the league for the majority of the season. See Log for the previous League campaign:

Chiefs, at the beginning of the 2014–15 South African Premier Division were drawn against Mpumalanga Black Aces in their first game of the cup competition the MTN 8, a match which they won 4–0 to progress to the semin-finals where they beat the defending champions Platinum Stars 2–0 and 3–0 respectively in both legs to set up a final with their Soweto counterparts and rivals Orlando Pirates. During this period, Baxter led chiefs to nine wins in six of their league matches and also their three cup matches leading up to the final. Amakhosi’s 10th victory in as many matches in all competitions this term was inspired by an unlikely source, captain Tefu Mashamaite, who wore the armband in Itumeleng Khune’s absence and vindicated coach Stuart Baxter’s decision to give him the role ahead of the more favoured Reneilwe Letsholonyane. Mashamaite, who captained his former club Bidvest Wits to the Nedbank Cup title in 2010, headed home the winner just before the half-hour mark against a Pirates side that seemed hypnotized for the better part of this match

Baxter won his third trophy at the club in just his third season to start off yet another season with the MTN 8 trophy on Saturday 20 September 2014. Also see:

On 2 June 2015 Stuart Baxter parted ways with Kaizer Chiefs.

Genclerbirligi

On 9 June 2015 Stuart Baxter has join Turkish club Genclerbirligi, but his contract was mutually terminated on 24 August 2015 after defeats in the first two games of the 2015–16 season.

Family

Baxter has a son, Lee, who is also a former professional football player and now a goalkeeping-coach for AIK. His brother was also a professional footballer, but who died of cancer in his early 30s. Baxter also has daughter Kelly 33, both Lee and Kelly are from his previous marriage to Sandy Baxter and also Stuart has Natalie 21 and Sean 15 with his present wife Cecilia who is Swedish. Both Baxters sons play football, his younger brother Mick played football and even Baxters father William (Bill) played both in England and Sweden.

Honours

Manager

Club

Sanfrecce Hiroshima

• J. League Division 1 1st Stage Champions: (1): 1994

AIK

• Allsvenskan (1): 1998
• Svenska Cupen (1): 1998–99

Helsingborgs

• Svenska Cupen (1): 2006

Kaizer Chiefs

• Premier Soccer League (2): 2012–13, 2014–15
• Nedbank Cup (1): 2012–13
• MTN 8 (1): 2014

See also

• List of residents of Wolverhampton