Andoni Iraola is now in charge at Liverpool, but his management career began at AEK Larnaca in Cyprus, where he was sacked after a winless run of six league games. Seven years on, his rise to Anfield has been remarkable.
Iraola learned from that experience and rebuilt his career back in Spain with Mirandes. He then impressed at Rayo Vallecano and Bournemouth, earning his opportunity at Liverpool. For his former colleagues in Cyprus, the journey must seem surreal.
Were there any believers on that day in January when Larnaca drew 2-2 at home to Ermis Aradippou, the team that would go on to finish bottom of the table? The result extended the winless league run to six games, and Iraola paid the price with his job.
Were there clues beyond the results that Iraola was destined for bigger things, and that he was simply a victim of a trigger-happy firing culture at the Cypriot club? David Catala, who played under him at Larnaca, including in that final game, saw promising signs.
“He already had very clear ideas of what he wanted,” Catala says. “You saw it and, for sure, all the players were speaking about how he was going to become a fantastic coach. But to reach this level? To say that he would be at Liverpool? That is a big claim.”
Iraola had spent his entire playing career in Europe at Athletic Club, with a brief spell in the United States at New York City. His first foray into management with Larnaca took him well outside his comfort zone, although there was a Spanish contingent at the club.
A promising start in Europe
His initial impact was impressive. Larnaca negotiated three rounds of qualifying for the Europa League group stage, with wins over Dundalk, Sturm Graz and Trencin. Just as significantly, the players readily embraced his ideas.
“To be in the Europa League for a club in Cyprus was amazing,” Catala explains. “And the work that he did was good. These were the same ideas that he wants at Liverpool, actually, pressing high and wanting to be very aggressive with and without the ball.”
In Cyprus at that time, this approach was rare. “The rhythm of the game there was very slow. I was able to play there until I was 38 years old because that rhythm was not so high.” Iraola had a different vision of the game, one he had learned under Marcelo Bielsa in Bilbao.
Catala says: “Everything was more explosive with him, more rhythm, more intensity. You saw how Marcelo did it with Athletic Club. I remember sometimes it was like that for us. Crazy things like following man-to-man all over the pitch. That was crazy as players.”
He recognises now that it offered a glimpse of the future. “Football has gone in that direction. The way you have to press. It changed the mentality of the players.” Iraola, he adds, “changed a little bit the rhythm of the league in Cyprus.”
The collapse
For a while, it worked. At the start of December, 10 games into the season, Larnaca were second in the table behind Limassol, the only team to beat them during that period. Iraola’s side were actually ahead of the six-time reigning champions and eventual title winners APOEL.
But it unravelled quickly. A 5-1 home defeat to Bayer Leverkusen in Europe was sandwiched between three away trips on the island that yielded no wins. A home defeat by the odd goal increased the pressure before the brief Christmas break.
A loss away to Omonia, followed by the draw against strugglers Ermis, sealed his fate. There were some formation tweaks but nothing major. “He did not change too much in terms of his thinking about the way of playing against different teams,” Catala recalls.
The real lesson, Catala suggests, was that pressure arrives quickly in football, even in an environment that was supposed to offer some distance from the spotlight for a figure who had been so high-profile as a player. “If you are not getting results, it is difficult to have the trust of the owners.”
“Cyprus is very difficult for coaches, and especially for young coaches, because the owners of the football clubs, they are very passionate,” he explains. “And at the moment that you are not getting the results, they sack the coach like they are just peanuts.”
“As soon as you lose games, especially against the lower teams, immediately the fans are speaking with the owner and the owner is going crazy. You cannot have the stability that maybe you need when you are a young coach. This is what happened to Andoni.”
A valuable first step
Catala, who would go on to manage Larnaca himself and lasted a little longer than Iraola, has tried to take lessons from his old coach. He believes Iraola has benefited from the experience too. “It was still a good choice to start there,” he insists.
“Cyprus is not an easy place for anyone to work but it is a good place for a young coach to start their journey. He had the opportunity to coach a team in the Europa League, for example. Unfortunately, football everywhere is now very unstable for all coaches.”
“It was a short period. But he would have learned many things from his experience in Cyprus about how to manage situations. It was his first job, you have to take something from that. For sure, he has improved a lot since then and he has developed himself.”
Catala is delighted for his former team-mate’s old coach, now in charge at Liverpool. “I am happy for him. If you look at the last years, you can see that he is obviously a fantastic coach. I cannot say that I did not expect it, but it is a little bit of a surprise.” From the sack at Larnaca to Liverpool, the distance is considerable, but the signs were there.