Fernando Santos Biography

Fernando Santos, born 10 October 1954 in Lisbon, Portugal, is a Portuguese former footballer who played as a defender and current coach who works as the head coach of the Portugal national football team. Fernando Santos began his football career in 1966 as a youth player for Portuguese club Benfica, and played in the main team of the club until 1971, before moving to Maritima. He played for the latter for 2 seasons and was a player of Estoril Praia until 1975. He ended his career as a player when he was 33 years old.

He began his coaching career at Estoril Praia in 1987. Later he was coach at Porto, Benfica and Sporting, alongside Greek football's giants AEK,

and

. He was named coach of the decade in Greece in February 2010.

Fernando Santos was officially announced as Greece national team coach on 1 July 2010 for the next two years. He guided the Greeks to Euro 2012 and the 2014 World Cup, making it to the knockout rounds at both tournaments.

Santos took charge of the Portuguese national team on 23 September 2014. Under his guidance, on 10 July 2016, Portugal claimed their first-ever European championships, beating hosts France in the final. Santos signed a new contract with the Portuguese football federation on 19 July 2016, running until 2020. He was named national team head coach of the year by IFPIIS on 27 December 2016.

All You Need to Know About Fernando Santos Biography

After taking his side to the Euro 2020, they were able to qualify from Group F after finishing third behind France and Portugal. In the ranking of the best third-placed team, Portugal was first with 4 points. In the Round of 16, Fernando Santos’ Portugal was knocked out by being defeated 1-0 by Belgium.

Fernando Santos Information

Now that we know the Portuguese coach much better, in this section of

Fernando Santos biography

we will share more general information about him such as

Fernando Santos nationality

to let you know him even better.

Fernando Santos Bio

• Full Name: Fernando Manuel Fernandes da Costa Santos

• Nickname: Engenheiro do Penta

• Profession: Professional Football Coach

Fernando Santos Physical Stats

• Weight: 80 Kg

• Height: 1.82 m

• Eye Color: Dark Brown

• Hair Color: Grey

Fernando Santos Football Information

• Position: Defender

• Jersey Number: 4

• Professional Debut: 1973

Fernando Santos Date of Birth and Personal Info

• Date of Birth: 10 October 1954

• Birth Place: Lisbon, Portugal

• Zodiac Sign: Libra

• Nationality: Portuguese

Now stay tuned to this section of

Fernando Santos biography

as we want to share some info about

Fernando Santos childhood

.

Fernando Santos Early Life

He was born in Lisbon and at the age of 16 entered Benfica's youth academy, but his professional debut came with Estoril Praia, where he played in the three main tiers of the Portuguese football league. He was signed by the club in 1973 and debuted in the Primeira Liga on 7 September 1975, where he played the entire match that

won 2-0 at home against Farense.

The 1975-76 season ended with 13 appearances for him, where he contributed to his team's eighth-place finish. His first goal in the top flight came in the 1978-1979 season when he only missed one league game and Estoril finished eleventh.

In 1979 he transferred to

, where he was a regular player for one season before he made a return to Estoril, where he played for another eight years, including five in the Segunda Liga. In 1987, he retired from playing at the age of 33.

Fernando Santos Profile

Following his playing career, Santos chose to become a coach. He took over GD Estoril Praia in 1987 as head coach. He enjoyed his first successes there, finishing second in the Segunda Liga in 1990/91, winning the team promotion to the 1st Division. Subsequently, he managed to keep his team in a safe mid-table position in the league.

The next year, he and the team remained in the top Portuguese league. However, in 1993/94, the team struggled and dropped into the relegation zone. By the end of the season, Estoril was relegated. In the following season, Santos joined

, and under their new coach, Amadora developed from a relegation zone team to a mid-table club.

In 1997/98, Santos finished seventh, which was the best result in Amadora's history. His achievements attracted the attention of the top club

, who hired him in 1998 to replace António Oliveira. Now stay tuned to this section of

Fernando Santos biography

as we want to share some info about his Porto career.

FC Porto

The club won the national league at the first attempt but was knocked out of the cup at an early stage and were also eliminated from the UEFA Champions League in 1998/99 after the group stage. Santos missed out on the league title with Porto in the next two years, finishing runners-up but won the Taça de Portugal on each occasion.

AEK Athens

He was then replaced by Octávio Machado in 2001. Subsequently, Santos went abroad and signed a contract with Greek club

, where he led the team to the final of the national cup, winning 2-1 against Olympiakos Piraeus. They finished runners-up in the league. His achievements were honoured by the Greeks with the Super League Coach of the Year award.

Now stay tuned to this section of Fernando Santos biography as we want to share some info about his coaching career in Greece.

Spells in Greece and Portugal

However, the two parties ended up separating and Santos joined league rivals Panathinaikos Athens. While the team was heading for the league title, they lost it in the last two games.

In international competitions, the team was eliminated in the UEFA Cup quarter-finals against Porto. The coach returned home to

Lisbon in the summer of 2003, but without a title, he left the club the following year and moved back to Greece to become head coach of AEK Athens once again.

Santos took a rejuvenated team to the semi-finals of the cup and guided the club to third place in the league, three points behind champions Olympiakos Piraeus. He was once again voted coach of the year in the top Greek league.

During the 2005/06 season, he was runner-up in the league. It was announced in May 2006 that Santos would join

Lisbon for the new season. Benfica failed to win the league by the narrowest of margins. Not long after the start of 2007/08, Santos was fired by the club's board.

PAOK Thessaloniki

Between September 2007 and mid-2010, he was in charge of the Greek club PAOK Thessaloniki. He was tasked with rebuilding the financially and athletically struggling club along with the new club president Theodoros Zagorakis. To build a competitive team, the club made transfers as early as the summer of 2007.

During the winter break, Santos brought his compatriot and former international Sérgio Conceição to PAOK. The club finished the season in ninth place in the league. The coach and board agreed to sign players such as Pablo Contreras, Zlatan Muslimović and Pablo García in the summer of 2008 in order to improve the squad.

PAOK was still eight points behind champions Olympiakos Piraeus at the end of 2008/09, but that was good enough for second place. However, in the play-offs for the international competitions, Santos and his team lost out on

participation and only managed to enter the qualifying round for the 2009/10 UEFA Europa League.

In a bid to strengthen their squad, Santos and the club's board made further signings in the summer of 2009, signing Bruno Cirillo, Vitolo and Vasilios Koutsianikoulis. The club was beaten in the

play-offs by Dutch side SC Heerenveen. Everything went well again in the league.

They finished third at the end of the season. Santos then defeated AEK Athens, Aris Thessaloniki and Olympiakos Piraeus in the qualifying matches for the Champions League and advanced to the qualifying round for the most important European competition.

Following Greece's disappointing performance at the 2010 World Cup, long-serving German coach Otto Rehhagel resigned as national coach. Santos, who had just stepped down as PAOK coach, was appointed as his replacement. In 2009, the football coach was named Super League Coach of the Year for the third time.

Greece national team

Shortly afterwards, he joined the Greek Football Federation and signed a contract until 2012 to manage the Greek national team. Santos, as he had done in the past, was asked to lead the team to success by introducing new players. Santos brought in eight newcomers (including Giorgos Tzavelas) for the first international match under his leadership on 11 August 2010 against Serbia. The first game was won 1-0.

His first competitive game in charge came on 3 September in the European Championship qualifier against Georgia, ending in a 1-1 draw. He was named Super League Coach of the Year for the fourth time by the Greeks in December 2010.

The remainder of the European Championship qualifying campaign was highly positive, finishing unbeaten in Group F and qualifying for the 2012 European Championship as group winners, where Fernando Santos' team progressed through the group stage, only to be eliminated by Germany in the quarter-finals.

also successfully competed in the following qualification for the 2014 World Cup. Thanks to the play-offs against Romania, the Greeks managed to make it to the World Cup finals. Fernando Santos announced in February 2014 that he would resign as Greece's national coach after the World Cup in Brazil. He was able to lead the Greek team into the knockout round for the first time at the World Cup. Greece drew 1-1 with Costa Rica but was knocked out on penalties.

The referee sent him to the stands before the penalty shoot-out. Because of that, he was fined by FIFA and suspended for eight matches to be served in the next official matches of the team he will be playing for in the future. After the World Cup, he resigned as announced.

Now stay tuned to this section of Fernando Santos biography as we want to share some info about his coaching career with the Portuguese national team.

Portugal national team

Santos was appointed as Portugal's new coach on 23 September 2014 following the failure of his predecessor, Paulo Bento, to win their first Euro 2016 qualifier against Albania. With seven wins in the remaining seven matches,

qualified for the finals in style.

Portugal began the tournament disappointingly, however: following three draws against Iceland, Austria and Hungary, they only reached the knockout rounds in third place, courtesy of the new system. Afterwards, Santos' less-than-spectacular defensive tactics drew criticism: in both the round of 16 against Croatia and the quarter-final against Poland, Portugal did not manage a win after 90 minutes.

However, a 2-0 win over Wales in the semi-finals saw Portugal advance to the final for the second time since 2004. They beat favourites France 1-0 after extra time to win the European title for the first time. As a result, Santos and the national team were awarded the Order of Merit in their homeland.

As the European champions, Portugal participated in the 2017 Confederations Cup. They beat Mexico, hosts Russia and New Zealand in the group stage, but were beaten on penalties by Chile in the semi-finals to finish third.

Portugal lost 2-0 in their first match in Switzerland in the 2018 World Cup qualifiers but managed to win all nine of their remaining matches to book their place at the World Cup. Portugal advanced past the group stage and into the last 16 of the finals but was knocked out after losing 2-1 to Uruguay.

Portugal played Poland and Italy in Group A3 of the inaugural UEFA Nations League 2018/19. They won their group and qualified for the finals at home. There Santos guided the national team to the second title in the association's history with a 3-1 win over Switzerland in the semi-finals and a 1-0 victory over the Netherlands in the final.

Under Santos, Portugal qualified for the 2020 European Championship as group runners-up behind Ukraine. At the finals, Portugal was drawn in a difficult group with Germany, France and Hungary and, just like in 2016, they qualified for the knockout round as one of the best third-placed teams in the group. There, Santos' team was eliminated by Belgium in the round of 16.

Now stay tuned to this section of Fernando Santos biography as we want to share some info about his coaching style.

Style of Play

Fernando Santos was praised for his ability to create tight-knit teams and build team spirit. He has consistently shown great ability in terms of locker room management and communication with his players.

His favoured playing systems are the 4-3-3 or the 4-4-2, his idea to play on the opponent's mistake with a strong block defence, good ball recovery and a vertical and fast attack, and he is often considered to have a pragmatic style of play.

Reception

Many football fans and critics consider Santos as one of the greatest coaches in the country, as he has managed to win the only two trophies in the history of the Portuguese national team.

Fernando Santos outside Football

During the early years of his football career, on the advice of his father, Fernando Santos took a degree in Electronic Engineering and went on to work at the Hotel Palácio, in Estoril.

Fernando Santos Personal Life

In this section of Fernando Santos biography, we will take a deeper look into his personal life and share some information about things like

Fernando Santos life story

and

Fernando Santos religion

, stay tuned.

Family, Children and Relationships

Fernando has been married to his wife Guilhermina for 42 years and together, they have a son and a daughter. Their daughter is a judge and their son works as an economist.

Philanthropy

At the time of writing this article, there are no reports of any charity activities to his name on the English or Portuguese press.

Legal Issues

Likewise, there aren’t any reports about legal issues or disputes regarding Fernando Santos, the long-serving coach of Portugal national team at the moment.

Fernando Santos Career Statistics

In this section of Fernando Santos biography, we will take a look at his career stats on the international and club level.

Club

During his active playing career, he made a total of 242 league appearances for Estoril and Maritimo, scoring 4 goals.

Managerial

He has a win ratio of 49.95 percent with 502 wins, 252 draws and 251 defeats in a total of 1005 matches that he had coached his teams as of 29 June 2021.

Fernando Santos Honors

All of his career honours and titles came in during his coaching career, including the Portuguese league, Cup and Super Cup, Greek Football Cup, UEFA European Championship and UEFA Nations League, among others.

His individual awards and titles include Super League Greece Manager of the Year, Super League Greece Manager of the Decade, Best Sports Coach in Greece, European Coach of the Year – Alf Ramsey Award, IFFHS World's Best National Coach and some others.

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