Ole Gunnar Solskjaer was officially appointed as Manchester United coach to replace Jose Mourinho. Solskjaer is not a new face in the red devil camp, he had been previously wearing the uniform of Manchester United for 11 years.
Ole Gunnar Solskjaer was born on February 26, 1973, from a couple of Oivind Solskjaer and Brita Solskjaer, precisely in Kristiansund, Norway. Solskjaer was born to a family who likes sports. According to Manchester United News, his father is a wrestler.
At that time, the father wanted his son, Solskjaer, to follow his career. However, the sport turned out to be too heavy and rough for him.
Solskjaer had continuously studied about wrestling for three months but his body was too weak to be able to follow his father’s ideals. Solskjaer was even being bullied by his friends as his body was too weak and small. That is why he got the nickname as ‘Tiny Ole’, or Ole the little one.
After feeling unlucky in the world of wrestling, Ole began to pursue other sports he loved, which is football. Even every day, he was always sleeping with his favorite ball.
Since pursuing football, his days had always been filled with watching football matches, especially on Saturday on which he always took his time to watch football reviews presented by the BBC.
Besides watching football from television, Ole was often updated on the football world through other media, such as magazines in which every week always gave the latest news.
After starting to understand the meaning of real football, Ole started kicking the ball and playing around his house. His parents who knew it, quickly took an act as they did not want to waste the talent possessed by their child.
Right at the age of 8, Ole enrolled in a football academy in his area, Clausenengen. The Clausenengen Academy was a small club in the area near his home which was known as a place for children to study football. But at that time, Ole was doubted by his first academy because he was considered too small.
However, as time passed by, he began to grow up and had a body that was quite ideal. He developed to be better but not enough to be promoted to a professional team.
At that time Ole’s talent was quite promising, he scored 31 goals in 47 matches with his academy team, Clausanengen.
Right in 1995, Ole joined Molde, one of the most famous clubs in Norway. In Molde, Ole grew, he managed to score many goals. His abilities improved and he began to take several clubs’ attention.
But at that time he only wanted to play in England. His dream is to play in the world’s best competition.
After Manchester United failed to get Alan Shearer, this was where Solskjaer’s golden career began. Sir Alex Ferguson recruited him on July 29, 1996. In his first season, Solskjaer scored 18 goals. His best moment in Manchester United’s uniform was when he managed to bring United to win the European Champions League title in 1999.
That was where Ole Gunnar Solskjaer began to be loved and got a nickname of ‘The Super-sub’. Receiving offers from several clubs, Solskjaer remained loyal to Manchester United by rejecting all of them.
As a player, Solskjaer’s career was such a moderate one. He almost started all the matches on the bench. Although many attackers came passing at Old Trafford, Solskjaer remained loyal to the red devil.
After undergoing an impressive career with United, he decided to leave in 2007 and on August 2, 2008, a testimonial match between Manchester United and Espanyol was being presented to honor the loyalty of this Norwegian man. The match was attended by 69,000 fans.
After his decision to leave his historic team, Ole Gunnar Solskjaer received an honorary degree in his country, Norway. Right on October 25, 2008, he received an award as the first class knight of the Royal Order of St. Olav by the 5th King Harald of Norway. Solskjaer won the youngest nobility in Norway.
After ending his career as a soccer player, Solskjaer continued his journey by becoming a coach in the MU reserve team in the 2008-2010 range.
Together with the Red Devils reserve team, this “Baby Faced-Assassin” recorded pretty good achievements by winning the Lancashire Senior Cup (2008-2009), Manchester Senior Cup (2009) and the Premier Reserve League (2009-2010).
From the MU reserve team, Solskjaer’s coaching career continued to his old team, Molde. He came in 2011 when Molde was exactly 100 years old. Solskjaer’s magic as a coach was immediately seen in his first season in the Norwegian League. Molde, who has never won the Norwegian League title, managed to take it to become the champion for the first time in the history of the club.
Now, Solskjaer continues his coaching challenge by directing Manchester United, replacing Jose Mourinho who was fired for failing to meet the expectations of the red devil.
