Marc Wilmots

Marc Robert Wilmots (born 22 February 1969) is a Belgian professional football manager and former player who is the sporting director of Schalke 04.

During his club career as an attacking midfielder, he won trophies with KV Mechelen, Standard Liège and Schalke 04.

He represented the Belgium national team, earning 70 caps.

In his club career, which started in 1987, Wilmots played for Sint-Truiden, Mechelen, Standard Liège, Schalke 04, and Bordeaux.

He was in the Belgium squad for the 1990, 1994, 1998 and 2002 World Cups, as well as the 2000 Euro which Belgium hosted jointly with the Netherlands.

Wilmots has also been a politician, having sat in the Senate for four years for the Mouvement Réformateur party.

For Belgium, Wilmots scored 28 goals in 70 caps, his first coming in May 1990.

He went to four World Cups, playing in three.

After being an unused substitute in 1990, he played 54 minutes in 1994 without scoring, but scored two goals in 1998 and three in 2002, making him Belgium's leading goal scorer in World Cup history.

At Schalke, he helped them to the 1997 UEFA Cup final.

His goal in the first leg was cancelled out by Internazionale in the second leg, but Schalke went on to win the game on penalties, with Wilmots scoring the decisive goal.

Wilmots also played in Euro 2000, when Belgium co-hosted the tournament.

He also scored a goal against Brazil in the last 16 match of the 2002 World Cup which was disallowed because of a "phantom foul" on Roque Júnior.

According to Wilmots, the referee Peter Prendergast apologized for the error to him at half time.

Wilmots was named as one of the seven reserves in the 2002 World Cup All-Star Team.

He retired in 2003, after his second stint with Schalke.

During his time with Schalke, the fans there gave him the affectionate nickname "Das Kampfschwein" (The War Pig), which has been picked up by some English language journalists.

In Belgium he is known under the nickname the Bull of Dongelberg, an allusion to his birthplace.

He was elected to the Senate for the French-speaking conservative party, the Reformist Movement (Mouvement Réformateur or MR) in the 2003 federal election.

He received 79,437 votes, a number surpassed only by 17 other candidates in the whole country during the elections.

Wilmots became a football manager in summer 2004 for Sint-Truiden, but was sacked in February 2005.

In 2005, he announced that he wanted to resign as a senator, a rather unconventional and criticized constitutional move.

KV Mechelen

Standard Liège

Schalke 04

Between 2009 and 2012, he served as assistant manager of the Belgium national team under Dick Advocaat and later Georges Leekens.

On 15 May 2012, following the exit of Leekens, Wilmots assumed the Belgium reins on an interim basis before going onto become permanent coach, signing a contract until June 2014.

On 11 October 2013, Belgium qualified for the 2014 FIFA World Cup.

Wilmots is credited with "not only giving the young group confidence in themselves as well as enjoying a close relationship with his players but also at the same time being capable of instilling discipline to the squad."

During the group stage, Belgium topped the group with all three wins, before exiting the tournament at the quarter-final stage.

On 13 October 2015, Belgium won the group to qualify for the UEFA Euro 2016 in the last game of the stage against Israel. After a disappointing European Championship, Wilmots was fired by the Royal Belgian Football Association on 15 July 2016.

In March 2017 Wilmots was appointed as the manager of Ivory Coast national team.

However he was sacked from his position six months later after failing to qualify for the World Cup.

On 15 May 2019, Wilmots agreed a three years contract to become the manager of the Iranian national team, after Portuguese coach Carlos Queiroz left the team after eight years in charge following Iran's semifinal exit in the Asian Cup.

He officially signed his contract on 29 May, effective from 1 June 2019.

On 4 December 2019, following shock defeats to both Iraq and Bahrain he left his role as Iran coach after six games in charge.

On 11 November 2021, Moroccan team Raja CA announced that Wilmots would be their new head coach until 2024, succeeding Lassaad Chabbi.

Wilmots was sacked three months later by Raja on 21 February 2022.

On 3 January 2024, Schalke 04 announced that Wilmots became the sporting director of the club.

After retiring as a footballer, Wilmots went into politics.