Ralf Rangnick

Ralf Rangnick is the head coach of Austria at the 2026 FIFA World Cup, the country's first World Cup in 28 years. Born in Backnang in southern Germany on 29 June 1958, he is widely described as the godfather of modern German pressing football — the man who, in a famous 1998 ZDF interview, sketched a four-man flat back line and high-pressing 4-4-2 that would reshape the country's tactical thinking for two decades.

As a coach he passed through Ulm, Stuttgart, Hannover 96 and Schalke 04 — winning the 2011 DFB-Pokal and DFL-Supercup with the latter — before becoming the architect of the Red Bull football project. At Hoffenheim he produced a fairy-tale rise from the third tier to the Bundesliga; at RB Leipzig, in two head-coach spells and a long stint as sporting director, he built a club from the fourth division to the Champions League semi-final of 2019–20. A short, intense interim spell at Manchester United followed in 2021–22.

He took over Austria on 29 April 2022. He inherited a generation of talent that had failed to translate at major tournaments; he gave them a clear gegenpressing identity. After a strong Euro 2024, Austria topped their qualifying group and ended a 28-year wait for the World Cup. Austria are placed in Group J. With David Alaba, Marcel Sabitzer, Konrad Laimer, Marko Arnautović and Christoph Baumgartner, Rangnick has openly stated that the group stage is the floor, not the ceiling.