{"id":689649,"date":"2026-05-23T14:59:11","date_gmt":"2026-05-23T14:59:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/689649\/"},"modified":"2026-05-23T14:59:11","modified_gmt":"2026-05-23T14:59:11","slug":"steve-corica-has-won-more-a-league-championships-than-anyone","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/689649\/","title":{"rendered":"Steve Corica has won more A-League Championships than anyone"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Quietly, and without fanfare, Steve Corica is the most successful coach in the history of A-League Grand Finals.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The Sydney FC legend\u2019s case to be on the competition\u2019s Mount Rushmore mounts with another notch on his CV, a third Championship win as a head coach, to go with the two he won as a player.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><a href=\"https:\/\/football360.com.au\/auckland-fc-sydney-fc-a-league-grand-final\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Saturday night\u2019s 1-0 win<\/a> takes him above Ange Postecoglou, Kevin Muscat, Graham Arnold and Ernie Merrick for the most Grand Final wins in the A-League era, although, of course, Postecoglou won two National Soccer League titles with South Melbourne as well. <\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Corica was the match winning goal scorer at the Sydney Football Stadium in 2006; who would have predicted, 20 years later, how intertwined with the competition\u2019s history he would become. And in a purely poetic moment, he isn\u2019t just the coach who masterminded the first A-League Championship win hosted outside Australia, but did it against the club that let him go.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">\u201cOne of the best (wins) and even sweeter just because it\u2019s against Sydney FC,\u201d he beamed on Paramount after full-time.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">\u201cOf it\u2019s against my old club but I think starting a new club like this to win two trophies in our first two years, it\u2019s like a dream.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">He continued: \u201cSo proud of everyone at the club obviously the staff the players they worked their hearts off tonight and they really deserve it.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">\u201cFor the crowd, a home grand final is always, always special and it was a packed house and it was unbelievable.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Auckland picked Corica up quickly after his Sydney tenure ended, choosing the Australian to be the man to build a New Zealand franchise.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">\u201cWe were brought here to win trophies and we\u2019ve two in our first two seasons so I\u2019m just extremely happy for everyone,\u201d he said on Paramount.<\/p>\n<p lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\">No man has won more A-League Championships as a head coach than Steve Corica.<\/p>\n<p>In total, that&#8217;s THREE Championships as manager\u2026 to go with the two he won as a player!<\/p>\n<p>He scored in the very first Grand Final, and now, he&#8217;s masterminded a win in the first Grand Final ever played\u2026 <a href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/jzukkBUE1m\" rel=\"nofollow\">pic.twitter.com\/jzukkBUE1m<\/a><\/p>\n<p>\u2014 Football360.com.au (@football360au) <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/football360au\/status\/2058152477145677929?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">May 23, 2026<\/a><\/p>\n<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">He continued: \u201cI was very nervous before this game actually. I played against my old club, we\u2019re in front of our home (fans); because all I wanted was to win for everyone.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">\u201cMy family were here, which we sacrificed a lot during the year. They live in Australia and Sydney. They\u2019ve come over (except) shout out to my daughter Chloe (who has a wedding tomorrow).<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">\u201cWinners are always very important in our squad- mixed in with a couple of Australians as well which is a good blend.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">\u201c(Football Director and former Sydney FC teammate) Terry McFlynn was a big part of this, (analyst) Doug Kors as well \u2013 it\u2019s not just myself there was three of us at the start and searching for players and watching games all the time in New Zealand and I\u2019m just obviously happy for them and happy for everyone.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><a href=\"https:\/\/football360.com.au\/rhyan-grant-column-sydney-fc-auckland\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">In a column for football360.com.au prior to the game, Sydney FC captain Rhyan Grant paid tribute to his former teammate and coach. <\/a><\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">\u201cI wanted him to do well in Auckland \u2013 I don\u2019t really understand why people sometimes don\u2019t have the best things to say about him. It\u2019s wild that he has to prove himself for whatever reason \u2013 but \u2013 that\u2019s what makes him great, he always wants to be the best,\u201d he wrote.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">\u201cYou simply cannot question his record; Auckland has almost been the benchmark since they\u2019ve come in, under his leadership.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">\u201cWhat is it that makes Steve a unique leader? He kept our group at Sydney really happy; he had a good understanding of the players, was spot on with his recruitment over the years and was able to create a good blend across the park.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">\u201cI have a lot of respect for him.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">\u201cWhat\u2019s the best sign of that? I always wanted to play my hardest for him. That\u2019s what good coaches make you do, organically. At Sydney FC, he\u2019s a club legend and we always wanted to do well for him. And we did, for a long time.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">He might have been let go by Sydney FC but he has shown in Auckland he isn\u2019t a one trick pony. Hopefully people can now see how good he really is.\u201d<\/p>\n<p><img fetchpriority=\"high\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"819\" height=\"1024\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/1080x1350-1-819x1024.webp\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-32730\"  \/><\/p>\n<p><script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Quietly, and without fanfare, Steve Corica is the most successful coach in the history of A-League Grand Finals.&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":689650,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[563],"tags":[325426,64,22065,63,596,85,336571],"class_list":["post-689649","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-football","tag-a-league-grand-final","tag-au","tag-auckland","tag-australia","tag-football","tag-sports","tag-steve-corica"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/689649","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=689649"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/689649\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/689650"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=689649"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=689649"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=689649"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}