Conny Karlsson

Conny Karlsson (2009)

Conny Karlsson (born November 21, 1953 in Oskarshamn ) is a former Swedish football player . The defender , who is now a coach, won the UEFA Cup as a player with IFK Göteborg and played for the Swedish national team in four international matches between 1980 and 1985 . As a coach, he won the triple of the Swedish championship, national cup and Supercup with Helsingborgs IF in 2011 .

Career

Player career

Karlsson started playing football at IFK Oskarshamn in his hometown. Before the 1975 season he joined the second division IFK Göteborg. After he was denied promotion to the Allsvenskan as second in the table of the southern season behind Kalmar FF in his first year at the club , he reached the top Swedish division as the season winner at the end of the following season. At the side of Ralf Edström , Olle Nordin and Reine Almqvist , he established her team in the front division and reached a European cup place two years after promotion as third in the 1978 season . In the summer of 1979 he won his first title with the club under the direction of Sven-Göran Eriksson, who was newly signed in the spring , when Åtvidabergs FF was outclassed in the final of the Swedish national cup with a 6-1 win.

As runner-up in the 1979 season, Karlsson narrowly missed the double with the team . In the following seasons, the defender , who had meanwhile risen to the team captaincy , remained with the club without a title, but regularly reached the UEFA Cup. This qualified him for the national team, in which he made his debut in April 1980 on the occasion of a 1: 5 defeat against the national team of the USSR . With the club plagued by economic problems, he finally achieved the great triumph in 1982. In the 1981/82 UEFA Cup , he moved with the team to the quarter-finals against Valencia CF after victories over Valkeakosken Haka , SK Sturm Graz , Dinamo Bucharest . After the club's presidium resigned due to the increasing problems that almost prevented a journey to Spain for the first leg, he was one of the decisive protagonists, after a 2-2 away draw after goals from Ruben Svensson and Torbjörn Nilsson as well as one The 2-0 return success in front of 50,000 spectators and the semi-final success against 1. FC Kaiserslautern laid the foundation for the club's recovery. Against Hamburger SV , who were favored in the final, they scored a 1-0 home win in the first leg with a late goal from Tord Holmgren . In the second leg, too, he was at the side of Glenn Hysén , Glenn Schiller , Stig Fredriksson and goalkeeper Thomas Wernersson responsible for ensuring that the north German club remained without a goal. The Gothenburg tactics that had made them unbeatable in the course of the European Cup season - consistent counterattacking from a safe defensive chain - was also successful in the second leg and after goals from Dan Corneliusson , Torbjörn Nilsson and Stig Fredriksson, he won the trophy after the 3-0 return win to reach into the sky. A short time later he added another title win with the renewed cup win, before the triple had been achieved at the end of the championship finals of the 1982 season after a final victory against Hammarby IF under the direction of Gunder Bengtsson , who had replaced Eriksson as coach in the summer .

Like some of his colleagues, Karlsson followed the call of the money and left the Swedish championship, which was still operated according to amateur rules. He was hired by Toronto Blizzard , a club that played in the US NASL . There he ran on the side of his compatriot Jan Möller and with Arno Steffenhagen , Jimmy Nicholl , Randy Ragan and Bruce Wilson . In 1983 and 1984 he reached the final of the championship with the team, the victory of the Soccer Bowl was missed against the Tulsa Roughnecks and Chicago Sting respectively.

Before the Allsvenskan season in 1985 , Karlsson returned to Sweden after two years in North America. At the side of Sören Börjesson and Jan Hellström , he moved into the championship final with the Örgryte IS team supervised by Agne Simonsson . In the Gothenburg duel with his former IFK Göteborg station, he won the club's first championship title since 1913. In the following seasons, the success could not be confirmed and after an eighth place in the table in the 1987 season, he ended his active career.

Coaching career

Karlsson moved to the coaching bench of his last playing station immediately after his career ended and became an assistant to Bob Houghton . He reached the championship finals in the 1988 season with the team around Peter Karlsson , Glenn Martindahl and Sven Andersson , but in the semifinals the club failed against the team of the later champions Malmö FF, which was coached by Roy Hodgson , around players like Martin Dahlin , Roger Ljung or Jonas Thern .

In 1991, Karlsson took over his first post as chief coach. He led the second division Landskrona BoIS after a seventh place in 1991 in the 1992 season to the runner-up in the autumn series behind Helsingborgs IF . The following year, in which the season was played again in a uniform series over the entire season, he scored 19 wins with the team in 26 season games. Thus, the club won the southern season with nine points ahead of runner-up IFK Hässleholm and 16 points ahead of the best non-promotion place occupied by Kalmar FF .

In light of the success that had given him a name outside the country as a coach, Karlsson accepted an offer from the Norwegian club FK Haugesund . After he had played in his first season with the second division against relegation, he led the club in the 1995 season with six points behind the relegation place occupied by Sogndal Fotball to fourth place in the final table. The following season was more successful: 14 wins and five draws in 22 games meant the second division championship and thus promotion to the Tippeligaen . There the team played in the lower midfield and managed to stay in the league, especially due to the seventh-best defense with 38 goals conceded in 22 games. Only in the games against Rosenborg BK , which ended with a 5-0 away and 6-2 home defeat, did the team concede too many goals. The 1998 season began disastrously, after four matchdays the team was bottom of the table without points and only celebrated their first win of the season on matchday seven with a 4-0 away win at third-bottom Sogndal Fotboll. Until the end of the season, the team stayed in one of the last three places and missed the jump to a relegation place due to a 1-1 draw on the last day of the game against their direct competitor Kongsvinger IL and had to be relegated directly.

After the clubs and coaches parted ways, Karlsson took over the coaching position at Ham-Kam . He was also successful in the third division and led the Hamar club straight away into the second division. In the course of 2000, however, he returned to Sweden and took over the relegation battle in the second division Kalmar FF, which he steered to tenth place in the table by the end of the season. In the second division season 2001 he again showed his talent as a promotion coach and rose with the club as first in the table before Landskrona BoIS and Mjällby AIF in the Allsvenskan. There the team played against the direct relegation, so that the club released him during the season and replaced him with Nanne Bergstrand .

After a brief engagement with Assyriska Föreningen , Karlsson took over the second division side Trelleborgs FF in 2004 . In 2006 he rose with the team to the Allsvenskan, at the end of the following first division season, the club separated from him and replaced him with Tom Prahl . He then returned to Norway again and trained Sparta Sarpsborg in the Adeccoligaen until summer 2008 . After half a year of unemployment, he took over Assyriska for the second time in early 2009. With the club he reached the relegation place in the second division season 2009 behind Mjällby AIF and Åtvidabergs FF. After a 2-0 first leg win against Djurgårdens IF , the team missed promotion after a 3-0 defeat after extra time in the second leg.

Karlsson had drawn attention to himself again in a higher class. At the end of November 2009, the Allsvenskan club Helsingborgs IF signed him as a coach. Since he did not have the coaching license required to work as a coach in Europe from 2011 , the club submitted an application for a special permit with reference to its longstanding coaching activity and the corresponding successes at Svenska Fotbollförbundet , but this was rejected in December.

Nevertheless, the club continued to rely on Karlsson and provided him with a licensed assistant in Per-Ola Ljung . In the season 2011 was the decision fruits, won when the club both the Championship and Cup and Supercup. After Ljung was fired by sports director Jesper Jansson in the summer of 2012 , Karlsson resigned from his position as head coach a week later in protest against this decision and due to the already tense relationship with the sports management.

At the beginning of 2013, Karlsson took over the coaching position at the second division club IK Brage . However, the success failed, the club found itself directly in the relegation battle. Therefore, he ended his engagement in June of that year at what was then bottom of the table.

Individual evidence

1. ↑ trelleborgsallehanda.se: "Före detta TFF-tränare tar över Assyriska" (accessed on June 24, 2010)
2. ↑ aftonbladet.se: "Conny Karlsson tar över Helsingborg" (accessed on June 24, 2010)
3. ↑ hd.se: "Karlsson hinner inte gå klart utbildningen" ( Memento of the original from October 29, 2013 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. (accessed on June 24, 2010)  
4. ↑ fotbollskanalen.se: "Conny Karlsson lämnar Helsingborg i protest" (accessed on June 15, 2012)
5. ↑ eurosport.se: "" Conny Karlsson tar över Brage "" (accessed on November 7, 2013)
6. ↑ dn.se: "Conny Karlsson slutar i Brage" (accessed on November 7, 2013)

Web links

• Conny Karlsson in the database of weltfussball.de