Football: Should the National Coach Be Elected by Fans?

For the manager of an elite level football club, intense fan and pundit scrutiny is part and parcel of the role and, depending on the country, it could be argued that this pressure is at its greatest at the international level.

Now coming to a close, this season's first international break brought us a high profile example of when the pressure and criticism got too much. The German FA relieved head coach Hansi Flick of his duties after a dismal run of games was capped off with a 4-1 friendly loss to Japan.

While Germany's replacement will ultimately be decided by their FA, Statista's European Football Benchmark 2023 posed an interesting question to its survey respondents: Should the national coach be elected by fans?

The results show that in Germany at least, Flick's potential replacements should be safe from such a radical reform. In Germany, a minority of about 30 percent of the football fan respondents were in favor of a fan-based election. In other European countries, the majority of respondents were also against it. Football fans in China see it differently though. A slight majority (55 percent) of Chinese football fans agree with the idea of having the national team coach elected by the fan community.