Mark Otten: From Ferencváros Player to NEC Academy Coach

– On the door opening to the conference room of the NEC academy, there is a picture of you dribbling the ball as a club player. Are you proud of the fact that it started from here at the time?
“It’s possible, although I’m not the only one with such a photo in the building,” said 37-year-old Mark Otten, the former defender of Ferencváros, to Nemzeti Sport, whom we visited in his hometown, Nijmegen. – While my photo was in a prominent place, the poster of perhaps the most famous student of the club, Jasper Cillessen, was displayed in a place where not even a bird goes. By the way, there are illustrations in the changing room corridor, from which you can read what tasks have to be performed at which position, and what abilities and qualities are required to be effective in the given role. My photo was attached to the center back on the right, and although they note that height and speed are important, I didn’t recognize myself in any of them.

“Then here’s your chance to authentically describe yourself as a coach!”
– I have a simple idea about football: you have to play to win. I expect a united action, courage from my players, and of course passion. These values ​​must be mastered by the team I have prepared, but I have a flexible approach to tactics, which is influenced by many factors. In addition to being successful, it is important to me that my team’s game is recognizable. In the case of certain coaches, it can be like giving their club their signature – if Liverpool and Manchester City played against each other in uniform, you could tell which was which by their style.

– What goal did you set for yourself in the coaching field?
– Courage: I would like to coach the teams in which I played football, I would like to be the coach of NEC, Feyenoord or Ferencváros. I want to give something back to these clubs because I got a lot from them. I strive to surpass the level I achieved as a coach as a player.

– Although he is only thirty-seven years old, he has been coaching for almost a decade. Who have been your biggest influences in your career?
– Mario Been was not my best coach, but I got along well with him, we had a great relationship, I felt his trust and I believed in him that I could do anything, that I was a good player. I was impressed by the way the former academic director of NEC, Iddo Roscher, handled different situations. His work made it clear that the point is not what happens, but how I answer the questions with my decisions. I can’t leave out Ricardo Moniz either, he also had a great influence on me. His passion, humility for the game and his work is impressive. I appreciated his honesty and wanting to help everyone. Of course, I didn’t only learn from the good coaches, but also watched the bad ones and filtered what I shouldn’t take from them. I often tell my players that they can learn from everything and everyone. There is a motto written on the wall in the clubhouse: Be better than yesterday, and tomorrow surpass yourself today! I live my life in this spirit.

– As a player, he was a great fighter, he came back from several injuries, his attitude could not be criticized. Tell me, with 58 Dutch top-flight games under your belt, how did you feel when you signed for Ferencváros in the summer of 2011?
– I was happy that I could play in Ferencváros because of the mentality and atmosphere characteristic of the club, but when I arrived in Budapest, this feeling had not yet passed. I remember driving on the expressway from the airport and asking myself, where did I end up and why did my manager bring me here? After the first training session, I was like, I can build myself up here, and then I met Gábor Kubatov, who told me what trials the association has gone through in recent years. I felt that our story resonated, as I considered myself a footballer with great potential: I was team captain in the U19 Dutch national team, Feyenoord bought me, then NEC, but, like Fradi, I didn’t keep where I should have been. At first, I had no idea what awaited me, what team I would join, what country I would live in, what it would be like away from home. Everything was new to me.

“Pleasantly disappointed?”
“I was just scratching my head!” I was surprised that, in the days after the signing, my photo appeared on the front page of Nemzeti Sport. My manager, Georgi Attila, said it was a big deal that the country’s most popular club signed a top Dutch player. My first match for Fradi will remain memorable, I scored a goal against the Armenian Ulisses in the Europa League qualifier. The next day, a guy came up to me in a department store, asked which foot I scored the goal with, and after I answered him, he kissed my foot. That’s when I realized that people are obsessed with Ferencváros, and I didn’t even think about what would have happened if my movements had not succeeded at first.

– He probably hoped for a more successful continuation, since he played in 43 matches in green and white in three seasons.
– I wanted to become the player I was before my injury. My first year and a half was fine, I became team captain, I extended my contract, then my performance dropped, because of my pain I couldn’t do what I could have done.

– He gave up football at the age of twenty-eight. Was there no chance to continue?
– After my contract expired in the summer of 2014, I received several offers from the Dutch second division. Due to my back and knee pains, I visited my doctor in the Netherlands at the end of the season, and after the MRI examination, he said with wide eyes that he did not know what had happened during my three years in Hungary, but that I should stop playing football immediately, because according to the findings, I was in such a condition I have knees like I’m eighty-eighty-five years old. He didn’t want to believe that the previous week I was still playing in Fradi’s reserve team, he thought it was unthinkable to run with such a knee. It was a shock to face this, I tried to play in the lowest possible Dutch division, but it was also demanding, I couldn’t even walk for three days after a match. Then I stopped for good.

“He put his life on the line for football.” How did you handle this situation?
– I realized that I no longer have to fight with my body, I don’t have to expose myself to the trials and tribulations of training and matches. Earlier, I was motivated to recover from injury, but then I realized that I don’t have to fight anymore. I was looking for new challenges, namely on the coaching field, which I really enjoy.

– Have you visited Hungary since you moved home from Budapest?
– Many times. My wife and I sometimes talk about how it would be nice to show our children Budapest, so we are planning another vacation.

– Do you follow the events related to Ferencváros?
– I can imagine, I saw that the team defeated Újpest away on Monday. I was happy with the club’s progress in the Champions League and Europa League, as well as the championship titles in recent years. As a coach, I was curious about how Stanislav Cherchesov would pull the team out of the pit, because the team was in bad shape. It’s good to see that the club is constantly developing, I trust that it will continue to do so in the future – who knows, maybe one day I will be able to add something to its success.