Igor Tudor

Igor Tudor

Tudor with Hajduk Split in 2014
Personal information
Date of birth (1978-04-16) 16 April 1978
Place of birth Split, SFR Yugoslavia
Height 1.93 m (6 ft 4 in)
Playing position Defender, defensive midfielder
Senior career*
Years Team Apps† (Gls)†
1995–1998 Hajduk Split 58 (3)
1996 → Trogir (loan) 5 (1)
1998–2007 Juventus 110 (15)
2005–2006 → Siena (loan) 39 (2)
2007–2008 Hajduk Split 8 (1)
Total 220 (22)
National team
1994 Croatia U16 1 (0)
1993 Croatia U17 4 (0)
1994–1995 Croatia U18 3 (0)
1995 Croatia U19 2 (0)
1994–2000 Croatia U21 12 (2)
1997–2006 Croatia 55 (3)
Teams managed
2013–2015 Hajduk Split
2015–2016 PAOK

* Senior club appearances and goals counted for the domestic league only.

† Appearances (goals)

Igor Tudor (born 16 April 1978) is a Croatian football manager and former player.

Tudor spent much of his career at the Italian club Juventus, winning several trophies, and during this time, he was considered one of Croatia's best defenders in the period between the late 1990s and mid-2000s. Tudor was a large, hard-working, strong and imposing defender, who excelled in the air, making him a dangerous goal threat during set pieces.[1] He was also a tight man-marker and a hard tackling defender, with great tactical intelligence.[1] Although primarily a central defender, he was capable of playing anywhere along the back line and even as a defensive midfielder, which was made possible due to his tactical versatility, stamina, and his surprisingly capable technique, ball control, and distribution skills, for such a large, physical player.[1] Despite his talent, he was also prone to injuries, which is often thought to have affected his playing career.[2]

He represented Croatian national side at Euro 2004, and the 2006 World Cup, but missing the 2002 World Cup due to injury.[2] Tudor announced his retirement on 22 July 2008, at the age of 30, after the problems with his right ankle reappeared. He spent his last season playing for his youth club, Hajduk Split.

As a manager, he took charge of Hajduk Split from 2013 to 2015, and spent eight months with PAOK FC in the 2015–16 season.

Club career

Early years

Tudor started his professional career at Hajduk Split in 1995 scoring 5 goals in 58 matches, being considered a revelation for his technique and ball control above the average of a defender.

Juventus

After three personally successful seasons at Hajduk Split, he was noticed and acquired by Italian giants Juventus in 1998. During his time with Juventus, he won the Croatian Player of the Year award in 2002.[3] During his 8-year spell with the club, Tudor was in excellent form, albeit injuries, and formed impressive defensive partnerships with the likes of Paolo Montero, Mark Iuliano, Gianluca Pessotto, Lilian Thuram, Ciro Ferrara, Alessandro Birindelli, Nicola Legrottaglie, Gianluca Zambrotta, Jonathan Zebina, Giorgio Chiellini, and Fabio Cannavaro. During the 2000–01 season under Ancelotti, Tudor had a prolific year, scoring 6 goals. The following season, with the return of his former Juventus coach, Marcello Lippi, he was occasionally deployed as a midfielder, scoring 4 crucial goals (1 against Torino in the Turin derby, 2 goals in Juventus's comebacks against Chievo and Verona, and 1 during the match against title contenders Inter) in Juventus's successful Serie A title campaign. The following season, he also scored a notable goal against Deportivo La Coruña in the last minute of a second round match of the 2002–03 Champions League, allowing the club to progress to the quarter finals of the competition, en route to the final, in which they were defeated by Italian rivals Milan on penalties. During this period, Juventus had one of the strongest teams in the world, and Tudor contributed well, with over 150 total appearances for the club, scoring nearly 20 goals, as a center back. However, after a major injury in 2004, Tudor was loaned out to AC Siena in January 2005, after 7 seasons with Juventus. Following the revocation of Juventus's 2004–05 and 2005–06 Serie A titles, due to their involvement in the Calciopoli scandal, as well as the expiration of his loan contract with Siena, Tudor returned to Juventus, staying with the club despite their relegation to Serie B, but injuries kept him off the pitch all the season. His contract expired on 30 June 2007. During his time at the club, Tudor won two Serie A titles, two Italian Supercups, a Serie B title, and an UEFA Intertoto Cup, also reaching the final of the 2001–02 Coppa Italia, and the 2002–03 UEFA Champions League.

Return to Hajduk

Constantly struggling with injuries and mysterious bacterial infection of his ankle, Tudor was almost forced to end his career in 2007, but in June 2007 he decided to join his former club Hajduk Split after not renewing his contract with Juventus. After a highly cautious rehabilitation process his comeback was in the match against NK Zadar on 20 October 2007. This was his first official match in over 16 months. However he was unable to reach his previous form and his ankle injury problems continued. On 22 July 2008, at the age of 30, he announced his early retirement, due to his recurring ankle injury problems.

International career

Tudor played for the Croatian national football team between 1997 to 2006. He also won several international caps for the Croatian under-17, under-19 and under-21 national teams between 1993 and 2000.

He made his debut in Croatia's final match of the 1998 World Cup qualifying, a 1–1 draw at Ukraine on 15 November 1997, coming on as a substitute for Aljoša Asanović in the 89th minute. He was subsequently also part of the Croatian squad that won the bronze medal at the 1998 World Cup finals in France. At the tournament, he made three appearances as a substitute in the closing stages of Croatia's games against Japan, Romania and the Netherlands.

After the 1998 World Cup, he made 4 appearances in the Croatian national team's unsuccessful qualifying campaign for Euro 2000, being in the starting line-up on all 4 occasions. He also appeared in 6 matches during Croatia's qualifying campaign for the 2002 World Cup, but missed the final tournament in South Korea and Japan due to an injury.

He returned to the national team during the qualifying stages for Euro 2004, appearing in seven qualifying matches. At the finals in Portugal, he appeared in two of Croatia's three group matches. In his first appearance at the tournament, a 2–2 draw against France, he scored an own goal to put the French side 1–0 up midway through the first half. His second appearance at the tournament came in Croatia's final group match against England, where he scored Croatia's second goal to keep their hopes alive after they found themselves 3–1 down in the second half. However, Frank Lampard soon netted England's 4th goal and Croatia were knocked out of the tournament in the group stage.

Tudor was also included in Croatia's 23-man squad for the 2006 World Cup finals in Germany, having appeared in 8 qualifying matches for the tournament, also scoring two goals. He recorded his first goal of the qualifying when he scored Croatia's final goal in their 3–0 win at home to Malta on 30 March 2005. His second goal of the competition came in Croatia's 3–1 win at Bulgaria on 4 June 2005, when he put Croatia 2–0 up just over half an hour from time. At the 2006 World Cup finals, he started all of Croatia's three group matches and played the full 90 minutes in two of them. However, Croatia were eliminated from the tournament after a 2–2 draw against Australia in their final group match, with Tudor receiving his second yellow card of the tournament for complaining about the penalty kick from which Australia scored a 1–1 equaliser. He made no further appearances for the national team following the tournament.

International goals

Goal Date Venue Opponent Score Result Competition
1 21 June 2004 Estádio da Luz, Lisbon  England 2–3 2–4 Euro 2004
2 30 March 2005 Maksimir, Zagreb  Malta 3–0 3–0 World Cup 2006 Qualifying
3 4 June 2005 Vasil Levski, Sofia  Bulgaria 2–0 3–1 World Cup 2006 Qualifying

Career statistics

[4]

Club performance League Cup Continental Total
Season Club League Apps Goals Apps Goals Apps Goals Apps Goals
Croatia League Croatian Cup Europe Total
1995–96Hajduk SplitPrva HNL90
1995–96HNK TrogirTreća HNL51
1996–97Hajduk SplitPrva HNL23130261
1997–9826451315
Italy League Coppa Italia Europe Total
1998–99JuventusSerie A23160281
1999–200017151222
2000–0125651307
2001–02144622111
2002–03141111252
2003–041521050212
2004–05301040
2004–05SienaSerie A151
2005–06241
2006–07JuventusSerie B00
Croatia League Croatian Cup Europe Total
2007–08Hajduk SplitPrva HNL81
Total Croatia 717
Italy 15117
Total 222241042525824

Managerial career

Hajduk Split

He was hired by Hajduk Split in August 2009 to be the assistant manager to Edoardo Reja who then took charge of the Croatian giant. Tudor dramatically increased his managerial knowledge during the 7 months he spent watching and learning from Reja. In February 2010 Reja took charge of S.S. Lazio and because of that Tudor was fired from Hajduk but he didn't join Reja in Italy.

In December 2012 he was appointed by Hajduk's sporting director Sergije Krešić as the new Hajduk U-17 manager. After taking charge of the U-17 squad he went to spend some time at the Juventus Center in order to improve his managerial skills with Antonio Conte. During his time with the U-17 squad he managed to teach them how to play modern style football using the 3–5–2 formation. They managed to qualify for the U-17 Croatian Cup 2013 final.

In April 2013 he was hired as the new Hajduk Split manager. He lost his first away match against RNK Split, but in the 2012–13 Croatian Cup final first leg he defeated NK Lokomotiva 2–1 on Poljud. He achieved his first league victory against NK Osijek on May 17, 2013. He won the 2012–13 Croatian Cup after a 5–4 aggregate win against Lokomotiva in the final.

On 4 February 2015, Tudor resigned from Hajduk Split after managing the club for more than year and 9 months.[5]

PAOK

On 18 June 2015 he was hired as the new manager of PAOK FC, signing a three-year contract.[6] He lost 2–1 to Lokomotiva Zagreb in his debut with PAOK for the second qualifying round of Europa League.[7] He was dismissed on 9 March 2016 because of "unsuccessful results and disparaging comments about the quality of the team".[8]

Honours

Player

Juventus
Croatia

Manager

Hajduk Split

References

Specific
  1. 1 2 3 "Gli eroi in bianconero: Igor Tudor". Retrieved 12 September 2014.
  2. 1 2 "Addio Mondiali per Tudor Oggi verrà operato alla caviglia". Retrieved 12 September 2014.
  3. ↑ "Award-Winning Tudor Takes Plaudits In His Stride". Juventus Football. 1 January 2002. Archived from the original on 27 October 2009.
  4. ↑ "Igor Tudor". level-k.com. Retrieved 11 January 2011.
  5. ↑ "Unhappy Igor Tudor Resigns as Hajduk Split Coach". Croatia Week. 5 February 2015.
  6. ↑ "Ιγκόρ Τούντορ για τρία χρόνια στον ΠΑΟΚ". 18 June 2015.
  7. ↑ "Λοκομοτίβα Ζάγκρεμπ – ΠΑΟΚ 2–1". 16 July 2015.
  8. ↑ Wood, Graham (9 March 2016). "PAOK replaces manager Tudor with Vladan Ivic". Ekathimerini. Reuters. Retrieved 17 March 2016.
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