Lajos Czeizler

The native form of this personal name is Czeizler Lajos. This article uses Western name order when mentioning individuals.

Lajos Czeizler

Personal information
Full name	Lajos Czeizler
Date of birth	(1893-10-05)5 October 1893
Place of birth	Heves, Austria-Hungary
Date of death	6 May 1969(1969-05-06) (aged 75)
Position(s)	Goalkeeper
Senior career*
Years	Team	Apps	(Gls)
1921–1923	Vác	19	(0)
Managerial career
1923–1926	ŁKS
1927–1928	Udinese
1928–1930	Faenza
1930–1931	Lazio (youth)
1935–1936	ŁKS
1940	Västerås
1942–1948	IFK Norrköping
1949–1952	Milan
1953	Padova
1953–1954	Italy
1954–1957	Sampdoria
1957–1959	Fiorentina
1960–1961	Fiorentina
1963–1964	Benfica
*Club domestic league appearances and goals

Lajos Czeizler (5 October 1893 – 6 May 1969) was a Hungarian footballer and coach. With 11 major titles altogether, he remains one of the most successful football coaches of all time.^{[citation needed]}

Career

Czeizler was born in a Jewish family in Heves, Austria-Hungary.^[1] He played as goalkeeper with Vác in the Hungarian championship between 1921 and 1923.^[2]

He began his coaching career in the 1920s in Poland, in Łódzki Klub Sportowy, where he had between 1923 and 1926 his first coaching experience. After this he spent his first years in Italy, coaching the second division sides of Udinese and CA Faenza and from 1930 to 1931 the youth of S.S. Lazio.

From 1935 to 1936 he is coaching ŁKS again before moving to Sweden where his first engagement was in 1940 with Västerås SK. In the Between 1942 and 1948 he had his greatest successes with IFK Norrköping. There he achieved between 1943 and 1948 a record five championships and two national cups in 1943 and 1945.^[3] When he led Norrköping to the 1948 championship he became the oldest coach in Sweden to achieve this title. He was then aged 54 years, 8 months and 1 day. The record has since been lost to trainer Conny Karlsson with Helsingborgs IF.

After his time in Sweden he returned to Italy where he led A.C. Milan in 1951 to championship honours and a win in the Latin Cup, an annual tournament of the best teams from France, Spain, Portugal and Italy – an important contest in the absence of any other European competition. He coached the Italy national team in the 1954 FIFA World Cup. In the season 1961 he coached Fiorentina until January,^[4][5] and later, in June, this club won the Coppa Italia, defeating Lazio 2–0 in the final.

In the 1963–64 season he took S.L. Benfica to their fourth double of championship and cup of Portugal, and set a club record of 103 goals in 26 league matches.^[6]

Honours

IFK Norrköping

• Allsvenskan: 1942–43, 1944–45, 1945–46, 1946–47, 1947–48
• Svenska Cupen: 1943, 1945

Milan

• Serie A: 1951
• Latin Cup: 1951

Benfica

• Primeira Liga: 1963–64
• Taça de Portugal: 1963–64

References

1. Rich, Dave (25 January 2018). "How The Holocaust Swept Away European Jewish Soccer". The Forward. Retrieved 27 January 2018.
2. Lajos Czeizler^{[permanent dead link‍]} at nela.hu
3. http://www.svenskfotboll.de/
4. Domani Hidegkuti a Firenze (Corriere dello Sport, n. 261, data=2 novembre 1960)
5. Hidegkuti responsabile unico della Fiorentina (Corriere dello Sport, n. 22, data=25 gennaio 1961)
6. "Glorioso Benfica" [Glorious Benfica]. Record (in Portuguese). Portugal: Edisport: 66. 11 May 2010.