| Personal information | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| Full name | John Sinding | ||
| Date of birth | (1941-05-16)16 May 1941 (age 84) | ||
| Place of birth | Denmark | ||
| Position | Goalkeeper | ||
| Youth career | |||
| Skovshoved | |||
| Senior career* | |||
| Years | Team | Apps | (Gls) |
| 19??–19?? | Vordingborg IF | ||
| 19??–19?? | Glostrup IC | ||
| 19??–19?? | Skovshoved | ||
| Managerial career | |||
| 196?–1968 | Glostrup IC | ||
| 1970–1972 | Brøndby | ||
| 1972–1974 | Ballerup | ||
| 1975 | Brøndby | ||
| 1977 | Skovshoved | ||
| 1977–1979 | B.93 | ||
| 1979–1983 | Hvidovre | ||
| 1983–1984 | Glostrup IC | ||
| 1984–1985 | Hvidovre | ||
| 1988–1990 | Fremad Amager | ||
| 1991–1992 | Skovshoved | ||
| 1993 | RB 1906 | ||
| 2002 | Hvidovre | ||
| * Club domestic league appearances and goals | |||
John Sinding (Danish pronunciation:[ˈtjʌnˈse̝nte̝ŋ]; born 16 May 1941) is a Danish formerfootballmanager and player.
As a footballer, he appeared forVordingborg IF andGlostrup IC in the lower-tier local divisions and forSkovshoved IF in the higher divisions. After retiring as a player, Sinding decided to continue as a coach and in a span of 25 years he was employed as head coach, youth coach, goalkeeping coach and manager of 10 different Danish football clubs. The culmination of his coaching career took place in the early 1980s, when he ledHvidovre IF to aDanish Cup win in the 1979–80 season – the club's first cup title. He subsequently helped secure the club's thirdDanish championship in the1981 season.
Outside football, Sinding has been director and owner of the company W. JohansenApS.
Sinding's playing career began in the youth department atSkovshoved IF. In his active playing career as a senior player, he represented Vordingborg IF,Glostrup IC and his childhood club Skovshoved IF in the 1960s.[1][2] There, he appeared both in the lower tier local divisions for Glostrup and Vordingborg, as well as in the higher divisions for Skovshoved.
Sinding began his coaching career inGlostrup IC. In 1968, Sinding was hired as the new coach in the youth department ofBrøndby IF, which was then a lower tier club. Under his management the club's U17 team were promoted to the highest division in 1969, where they ended up in fourth place in the table in their first season. Sinding remained in the position as youth coach at the club for a year and a half.[3]
At the young age of 29, Sinding became head coach of Brøndby's senior team in 1970, which competed in the local divisions under theZealand FA (SBU). He initially only planned to coach the team for one season, which thus became his first season as a senior coach. After the complete merger of the largest sports clubs inBrøndbyøster andBrøndbyvester in 1964 – which resulted in the formation of Brøndby IF – the board of the club fromVestegnen decided that the new football club should aim to compete at a higher level. The first team's final position in the league standings – 10th place in theSjællandsserien (Zealand Series) – in the 1969 season had been deemed unsatisfactory, and the collaboration with the then head coachIb Jensen was discontinued and a major overhaul of the first-team squad was made. With his new appointment, Sinding thus set the goal of assembling an almost completely new first team and lead the team to promotion from the Zealand Series, ensuring the club a place inDanmarksserien (Denmark Series) by 1971.[4] The goal was finally fulfilled when Brøndby managed to win in the last matchday of the season which secured the Zealand Series title in the 1971 season which meant automatic promotion to the Denmark Series in 1972 with a squad consisting of players such asPer Bjerregaard,Tom Køhlert andEbbe Skovdahl, who would all go on to become key figures in the club afterwards. This achievement marked the club's second promotion since its foundation where it had been incepted in theSerie 1, the sixth tier of theDanish football league system. In the following season, however, the club's board chose to appointMogens Johansen as new head coach and shortly afterwards, former professional playerFinn Laudrup took over asplayer-coach for the first team.[3]
After his first stint at Brøndby IF, Sinding continued as head coach ofBallerup IF in the period 1972–1974. There, he led the team from the Denmark Series to the third highest tier (3rd Division East under the former league structure) in 1974, which was the first time this occurred in the club's history.[5] The team, which in the 1972 season had just missed out on promotion by a single point, won its Denmark Series group by beating Brøndby IF in the decisive match, after which they won the whole division after beatingViborg FF 1–0 in the divisional finals. Sinding returned to the position of head coach at Brøndby IF in 1975 to coach the newly promoted 3rd Division team. The goal from the board's side was this time position in the top six and a continuation of the club's attacking style of play. Sinding's stay at the club this time lasted two seasons, and ended short of the desired promotion.[6][3][7]
After leaving Brøndby again, Sinding held head coaching positions atSkovshoved IF and the1st Division (first-tier) clubB.93, where he was hired as a new coach to replace the outgoingErik Gynild. Sinding coached the side for a total of 80 matches (26 wins, 19 draws and 35 losses) between 1977–1979 and for a short period in the1977 season he also coached the club's 2nd senior team in the Denmark Series together with player-coachErling Bøje.[2] At the halfway point of the1979 season, after two years at B.93 with 13th place and 7th place finishes, respectively, the board of the club decided to dismiss Sinding due to the first team's relegation battle. The team had at that point lost six games in a row and bottom of the 1st Division, after which Bøje took over as head coach for the remaining 15 matches of the season and managed to heed the club from relegation, which was secured in the penultimate matchday againstSlagelse B&I.[8][2]
Subsequently, in 1979, he became head coach ofHvidovre IF, whom he led to the 1979–80 final of theDanish Cup, which the team won after a 5–3 win overLyngby Boldklub inKøbenhavns Idrætspark. The cup win secured Hvidovre IF qualification for theEuropean Cup Winners' Cup in the1980–81 season, where the team defeated Icelandic clubFram Reykjavík in the first round, but then suffered a defeat over two legs in the second round against Dutch sideFeyenoord.[9] In the1981 season, the team also becameDanish champions for the third time – a single point ahead ofLyngby Boldklub in second place.[10][11][12] He stepped back as head coach of Hvidovre IF at around the same time asMichael Manniche moved to Portuguese clubBenfica from Hvidovre in the summer of 1983. On his favorite coach, Manniche stated:
John could both be comfortable to be around and crude. But in the right way. He could motivate people. There are many "school teachers" in Danish football, but no one is going to make me say that there are too many. My mentality is just more aligned with John Sinding's values.[13]
After a short period as head coach ofGlostrup IC who competed in the2nd Division (second-tier), he returned to Hvidovre in the position of manager responsible for tactics, team selection, handling contract negotiations, outreach work and collaboration with the youth department around talent work, whereas Hvidovre's former coachKurt Stendahl continued as responsible for day-to-day training. This was also taken care of by Sinding himself later on.[14][15] In October 1985, just over a year after his re-employment at Hvidovre, Sinding was sacked after first-team players threatened the management with a major player flight if Sinding stayed on as manager.[16] Sinding reacted to the dismissal by launching a lawsuit at theØstre Landsret (High Court) against Hvidovre IF with a compensation claim ofDKK 350,000 for unjustified dismissal instead of trying to find a settlement.[17] Hvidovre IF suffered relegation from the top tier after the1985 season.
Prior to the 1988 season, Sinding moved to newly promoted2nd Division (second-tier) clubFremad Amager on a three-year contract. Four months before his contract expired, the board decided to dismiss Sinding with immediate notice on 18 August 1990, which was justified with "a lack of tactical abilities" – despite the team going through an undefeated stretch of eleven matches.[18][19] After the 1990 season, the team relegated to theDanish 2nd Division (third-tier),[fn 1] and his replacement as head coach, who had already been introduced two months before Sinding's dismissal, was former Fremad playerTonni Nielsen.[20] The dismissal of Sinding caused the chairman of Fremad Amager's professional department, Henning Bjerre, to resign the following day due to his dissatisfaction with the circumstances behind the decision to dismiss, which had been made by the three other board members.[18]
In the autumn of 1991, Sinding took over as the new head coach ofSkovshoved IF, competing in the 2nd Division East (third-tier), for the remaining three matches in the competition. The club had requested his assistance after firing former head coachLeif Staun the week before.[21] Sinding, however, could not prevent the relegation of his childhood club.
On 1 July 1993, Sinding was appointed the new head coach of 2nd Division clubRB 1906 on a six-month contract. He replaced the outgoing Benny Jensen, who had resigned during the summer break, as he had felt that he could no longer implement his ideas, and had, as a result, moved toVanløse IF instead.[22] RB 1906, who had lost half of their players from the spring season, ended the autumn season in 1993 in the penultimate place in the 2nd Division East, which meant relegation to theDenmark Series after 18 seasons as a club in the top three divisions.[23] In the spring of 1994, Sinding was replaced by RB 1906's new head coachCarsten Broe, who held the position of head coach for four years.
In September 1996, then-head coachKim Brink picked up Sinding at short notice to become a substitute goalkeeper coach forF.C. Copenhagen to train the club's two goalkeepers,Karim Zaza andFinnish internationalAntti Niemi. This was because the club's regular goalkeeping coach, formerDanish internationalOle Qvist, was at a four-week holiday in the United States.[24][25]
After two-and-a-half years,Peter Schmeichel ended his involvement in the 1st Division (second-tier) club Hvidovre IF's professional department, Hvidovre FodboldA/S, on 30 June 2002, whereupon the club was left with no capital (Schmeichel had made sure that the club had no more outstanding debt) or a coach, after the former managerJan Sørensen's departure during the summer 2002.[26][27] Since the club had to start all over again with no finances and a new squad mainly consisting oflower tier players, their management therefore contacted Sinding and persuaded him to take over as the manager of the team in the autumn season of 2002 in an unpaid / volunteering managerial role withSten Ziegler as the one responsible for the day-to-day practice.[28][29] The goal was to stabilize Hvidovre IF's first team in the second-tier and avoid relegation as well as securing a much-needed financial respite.[30] During the winter break of the2002–03 season, the club's management dismissed Sinding, in order for new head coach Jan Christensen, coming over from fourth-tier clubGladsaxe-Hero Boldklub, to take over the position as of 1 January 2003.[31][32]
In January 2008, Brøndby IF briefly engaged John Sinding again, in a position as "talent scout", and in this connection he was sent to Brazil to keep an eye out for attacking-oriented youth players for the youth academy together with the former goalkeeping coach Jørgen Henriksen.[33]
Alongside his football career, Sinding, who became self-employed in 1980 after 12 years at offshore supplierSemco, has been director and owner of a private installation company, W. Johansen ApS. A company of more than 33 employees located inBrønshøj, W. Johansen ApS specializes in ventilation, air conditioning and electrical installation.[1][34] Sinding took over the company in January 1979 and subsequently co-founded W. Ventilation ApS in January 1981 and W. Johansen EL in February 1984, respectively.[35] Since then, Sinding has divested his shares in the company.
Brøndby
Ballerup
Hvidovre