PETALING JAYA: Nelo Vingada (pix) has resigned as head coach of the Malaysian football team, barely six months after taking the job.
The Portuguese said that he took responsibility for the performance of the team after discussions with Football Association of Malaysia (FAM) president Tunku Ismail Ibni Sultan Ibrahim.
“With this sense of responsibility, I hereby announce that I relinquish my position as the national head coach with immediate effect and the President himself has also accepted my decision,” he said in a statement on Wednesday (Dec 6).
He added that two of his assistants, Joao Arnaldo Correia De Carvalho and Francisco Jose Bruto Da Costa have also resigned from their respective positions as national assistant coach and national fitness coach respectively.
“Finally, I like to take this opportunity to hope and pray for Malaysian football to shine again and that I was proud to be part of Malaysian football in this relatively short period of time,” said Vingada.
Under Vingada, Malaysia lost six of the seven matches they played, including four Asian Cup qualification matches.
Vingada had previously shouldered the blame for the poor results of Harimau Malaya and admitted that the team “are not ready to compete at the Asian level”.
He also said that he had never experienced such poor results with any team previously.
Vingada started his coaching career as an assistant to compatriot Carlos Queiroz.
They led Portugal to back-to-back FIFA Under-20 World Cup successes in 1989 and 1991.
Vingada is also well known in Asia, having coached the Saudi Arabia senior side (1996-1997), the Egyptian Olympic team (2004-2005), Jordan's national team (2007-2009) and the Iranian Olympic squad (2014).
At club level, he led Egyptian Premier League side Zamalek and South Korea’s K-League giants FC Seoul to domestic league and Cup triumphs.
Besides that, Vingada also coached Iranian powerhouse Persepolis and Chinese Super League side Dalian Shide.
Before the Malaysian job, he took North East United to fifth place in the Indian Super League.
