Word: reided
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...Dressed in an impeccably tailored suit, Reid sits alone in a glass-fronted VIP area above the main stand at the Bangkok stadium of Chulalongkorn United. Below him are a few hundred home fans and, opposite them, a few dozen supporters of the Provincial Electricity Authority, the league leaders. Reid has been watching as many league games as possible before picking his national squad. When asked what he's looking for in potential squad members, he replies, "Talent. Pace. Attitude." There are players with all three on the pitch, but Reid has a problem: the stadium's floodlighting...
...month later, Reid names a squad of 36 players and calls them to a meeting at the National Football Center, a grand name for a spartan two-story building set amid rice fields in the Bangkok boondocks. "It feels like a rehab clinic," grumbles one of Reid's staff. On the desk in front of him is the squad roster, a pristine copy of a book called English-Thai: The Fun Way to Learn the Language and a three-page cheat sheet of footballing phrases in Thai. Reid studies it. "Poo rack sah bra too," he says hesitantly...
...Reid vows to join his players in the blazing afternoon sun for a warm-up. "I'll be knackered," he grins. "I'll be on me knees after that, though." The players arrive. "Is this the boys?" says Reid, jumping to his feet. "Brilliant." Thirty young men file in, subdued and unsmiling. Reid greets them in both Thai ("Sawadee khrap!") and his native Liverpudlian ("All right, boys?"). They bow their heads and clasp their hands together in a wai, the traditional Thai gesture of respect. "Even though training will be hard, I like enjoying it," Reid tells them. "I like...
...past, reid's motivational style has inclined toward shouting and swearing, usually at the same time. But he has promised a new approach in Thailand. "I want to get the best out of these players and you can't do that shouting at anyone," he told reporters. Instead, Reid puts his primitive Thai to comic effect on the training ground. "Despite the language problem, you can have laughs," he says, before gamely - if not entirely successfully - attempting to count to five in Thai...
...training ground, Reid will also have to boost his team's fitness and morale: many players flag in the second half or hang their heads when they are a goal down. "You're not going to win every football match," he says. "I'm not that daft...