Quick Thinking and Calm: What Phillip Cocu Will Bring to Derby

 Phillip Cocu won three Eredivisie titles with PSV Eindhoven but only after a rocky period and time off for an operation. Photograph: Rogan/JMP/Rex/Shutterstock
Phillip Cocu won three Eredivisie titles with PSV Eindhoven but only after a rocky period and time off for an operation. Photograph: Rogan/JMP/Rex/Shutterstock
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Quick Thinking and Calm: What Phillip Cocu Will Bring to Derby

 Phillip Cocu won three Eredivisie titles with PSV Eindhoven but only after a rocky period and time off for an operation. Photograph: Rogan/JMP/Rex/Shutterstock
Phillip Cocu won three Eredivisie titles with PSV Eindhoven but only after a rocky period and time off for an operation. Photograph: Rogan/JMP/Rex/Shutterstock

Phillip Cocu played at Pride Park on 10 August 2001 in a routine pre-season friendly victory over Derby with Barcelona when Patrick Kluivert scored twice. Fast‑forward almost two decades and it is a stadium Cocu now calls home after replacing Frank Lampard in the Derby dugout.

Cocu won seven league titles at PSV Eindhoven (four as captain and three in five years as a manager) but a burgeoning reputation as a coach was dented by a disastrous 98-day reign at Fenerbahçe last year. It is an anomaly that blots an illustrious CV but, as with his predecessor, his surname is synonymous with success.

PSV went six years without a league title until Cocu guided them to consecutive triumphs, having endured a testing first full campaign in charge in 2013-14 when they finished fourth, 12 points behind Ajax. Cocu was unbeaten in his first seven matches – winning the opening three – but PSV then went two months without a league win and crashed out of the Europa League group stage. By the time they lost 6-2 at home to Vitesse Arnhem before the winter break, for whom Davy Pröpper scored twice, they were 10th and fans were restless.

“Supporters were really angry; they were almost going on to the field,” says Pröpper, who later played under Cocu at PSV for two seasons before joining Brighton in 2017. “For us it was crazy to win 6-2 away at PSV. The first half of the season went totally wrong for them. They lost a lot of games and when a smaller team comes to your stadium and wins by that margin it is too much. Normally you have three big teams in Holland – Feyenoord, Ajax and PSV – and they need to be close to each other in the league. Twelve points is way too far.”

At the turn of that year things were put into perspective when a tumour, later revealed to be benign, was discovered on Cocu’s lower back. He was forced to relinquish first-team duties for three months after an operation. Ernest Faber took charge and Frank de Boer, a former teammate for club and country, was among those to visit in the hospital before Cocu returned in June. And PSV kicked on.

A young and inexperienced side that struggled to come to terms with the departures of Kevin Strootman and Dries Mertens had matured and the success that followed proved worth the wait. PSV stormed to the title with a club-record 88 points; 12 months later they were Dutch champions again and also made an imprint on the Champions League, reaching the last 16. But arguably Cocu’s best season was his last, when PSV pipped Ajax to the title in 2017-2018, edging out Erik ten Hag’s vibrant side.

“How he [Cocu] was as a player he takes into his style as a trainer,” says Pröpper. “He can see the game very quick and for him it was easy to find spaces and that is what he is trying to do with his teams.

“His personality is really calm. He doesn’t show a lot of stress to the outside. He can tell the guys how he wants to play and it is not very difficult for him.”

Cocu, who counts Guus Hiddink and Dick Advocaat among his mentors, did his coaching badges alongside Dennis Bergkamp and his first steps into management came with PSV’s Under-19s, initially assisting Faber before taking the head coach role.

Cocu promoted Memphis Depay to the PSV first team in 2012 and he also improved Georginio Wijnaldum, work that appealed to Mel Morris, the Derby owner, who has invested heavily in youth. Derby have their own raft of exciting youngsters for Cocu to develop: Jason Knight, Max Lowe, Max Bird, Louie Sibley and Jayden Bogle, a right-back who shone under Lampard.

“The advantage you have with players from your academy, who are already five, six years at your club, if they come [through], they take with them the values of the club,” Cocu says. “If you take players from different areas they can add value to the club but they have to adapt to how the club works, how it thinks, the goals. The young players from the academy, they have it already.”

In Turkey, Cocu walked into chaos. Fenerbahçe were in debt to the tune of €600m and things ended in turmoil, with a club that has spent its entire history in the top division in an unfathomably precarious position, a point above the relegation zone when the Dutchman was sacked last October. Cocu’s arrival was supposed to usher in a new era under a new president, but things never clicked. The manager’s style of play was deemed dull, the language barrier was problematic (Cocu worked through a translator) and supporters felt short-changed in his efforts to make a connection with them.

“Seasons fly by at unbelievable speed and now I have been over 11 years as a coach,” Cocu says. “I’m not the type of guy who plans a year, who maybe stops and takes a break for a year. But when something happens and after a few months you’re out, you can say you’ll step in at the first opportunity you get or take a break. In this case I took a break.

“Sometimes, it’s good to step out of the [football] world – it’s going for 24 hours [a day] – which is positive, because everybody has a great passion for the game. But just to get some focus out and get some rest was good. But you don’t want to step in just the first one who passes by. It has to be a fit; it has to match your philosophy about the game. We’re here and I’m excited to start.”

As the Dutch saying goes, Cocu will need to mix water with wine. His appointment could have implications far beyond Derby, with Dutch coaches not as in vogue as they once were. De Boer’s short stay at Crystal Palace and Jaap Stam’s second season at Reading blighted their status in England but Cocu can help restore it.

“I hope he does great at Derby,” says Pröpper. “His last trip out of Holland wasn’t very successful but he is a really good coach.”

The Guardian Sport



Swiatek Reaches her 1st Wimbledon Semifinal, Will Face Bencic Next

09 July 2025, United Kingdom, London: Polish tennis player Iga Swiatek celebrates victory over Russia's Liudmila Samsonova during their women's singles quarter-final match on day ten of the 2025 Wimbledon Championships at the All England Lawn Tennis and Croquet Club. Photo: Jordan Pettitt/PA Wire/dpa
09 July 2025, United Kingdom, London: Polish tennis player Iga Swiatek celebrates victory over Russia's Liudmila Samsonova during their women's singles quarter-final match on day ten of the 2025 Wimbledon Championships at the All England Lawn Tennis and Croquet Club. Photo: Jordan Pettitt/PA Wire/dpa
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Swiatek Reaches her 1st Wimbledon Semifinal, Will Face Bencic Next

09 July 2025, United Kingdom, London: Polish tennis player Iga Swiatek celebrates victory over Russia's Liudmila Samsonova during their women's singles quarter-final match on day ten of the 2025 Wimbledon Championships at the All England Lawn Tennis and Croquet Club. Photo: Jordan Pettitt/PA Wire/dpa
09 July 2025, United Kingdom, London: Polish tennis player Iga Swiatek celebrates victory over Russia's Liudmila Samsonova during their women's singles quarter-final match on day ten of the 2025 Wimbledon Championships at the All England Lawn Tennis and Croquet Club. Photo: Jordan Pettitt/PA Wire/dpa

Iga Swiatek reached the Wimbledon semifinals for the first time with a 6-2, 7-5 victory over 19th-seeded Liudmila Samsonova that went from a stroll to a bit of a struggle in the late stages Wednesday.

"Even though I’m in the middle of the tournament, I already got goosebumps after this win," said Swiatek, who will face unseeded Belinda Bencic on Thursday for a spot in the final. “I’m super happy and super proud of myself.”

Bencic beat No. 7 Mirra Andreeva 7-6 (3), 7-6 (2) to reach her first Grand Slam semifinal since the 2019 U.S. Open. The other semifinal is No. 1 Aryna Sabalenka against No. 13 Amanda Anisimova; they advanced with wins Tuesday.

Swiatek is a five-time major champion, with four of those titles on the red clay of the French Open, and the other on the hard courts of the US Open. She's also twice been a semifinalist at the hard-court Australian Open.

The grass courts of the All England Club always had given her the most trouble as a pro, even though she did claim a junior championship there in 2018. In her five appearances in the Wimbledon women's bracket before this year, she had made it as far as the quarterfinals just once, exiting in that round in 2023.

But the 24-year-old from Poland is enjoying a career-best run on the slick surface, thanks in part to being more comfortable with the footing required.
“I, for sure, feel like I really worked hard to progress here on this surface,” The Associated Press quoted Swiatek as saying. “So this year, I feel like I can just work with it and work with myself. I’ll just keep doing that.”

Before the start of Wimbledon, Swiatek was the runner-up in Bad Homburg, Germany, her first final at a tournament played on grass — and her first final at any event in more than a year, a drought that resulted in her falling from the No. 1 ranking and being seeded No. 8 at the All England Club.

Her rough stretch included a one-month ban last season in a doping case after an investigation determined a failed out-of-competition drug test was caused by an unintentional contamination of non-prescription medication for issues with jet lag and sleeping. On the court, a semifinal loss to Sabalenka at Roland-Garros last month ended Swiatek's 26-match French Open winning streak.

Swiatek led by a set and 3-0 in the second against Samsonova, who was appearing in her first Grand Slam quarterfinal.

Soon, though, it was 4-all, then 5-all. But Swiatek held for a 6-5 lead, then broke to end it, and a smile spread across her face.

“I’ll just recover today, try not to celebrate too much, but already focus on the next one,” Swiatek said. “Prepare in the evening, and I’ll be ready tomorrow.”

Bencic, who at 28 is a decade older than Andreeva, is competing in her second major tournament since returning to the tour after giving birth to a daughter, Bella, in April 2024.

“I’m very proud, actually. All my career, I didn’t say it a lot to myself, but after having Bella, I really say it to myself every day,” Bencic said. “We are just enjoying life on tour with Bella, traveling. It’s been beautiful to create these memories together. And obviously, to play great is so amazing, but for me, it’s a bonus. I’m generally just really happy to be able to play again.”