Henry meets…Julen Lopetegui – World Soccer

Henry Winter sits down with Qatar head coach Julen Lopetegui to discuss the World Cup, keeping Wolverhampton Wanderers and West Ham United in the Premier League, and returning to England…

Julen Lopetegui is a curious head coach to evaluate. He gets criticised at times, didn’t last long at West Ham United last season, yet left them in 14th and has since performed a near-miracle in guiding Qatar to the World Cup. He guided Spain through one of their most impressive qualifying campaigns, won the Europa League with Sevilla, rescued Wolverhampton Wanderers and still he gets questioned. Why?

Lopetegui joins our zoom meeting from his office in Doha, sun filtering in, smiling at mention of rain and snow in England, and soon weighing up where leading Qatar to the World Cup ranks amongst his achievements as a head coach. “We can talk about the other achievements, about the Europa League [in 2020], about the best qualifications in the history of Sevilla, three times consecutively for the Champions League,” he recalls. “With Wolves, we had a big achievement putting them out of the relegation [zone]. When we arrive, we were bottom, five points from safety. We did an incredible six months. We did very, very good numbers in the second half of the season. I think European numbers.” Wolves took 31 points from 23 games under him to finish 13th in 2022-23.

“When I think about my best achievements as a coach…one of them is the qualification for the World Cup. This has been one dream because it never happened in the history of Qatar.” The Gulf state had qualified for a World Cup only as hosts before in 2022. Lopetegui performed a rescue act on taking charge in May 2025, defeating Iran to reach the play-offs where they drew with Oman and then faced a strengthened United Arab Emirates.

“UAE renewed their squad in the last three years because they have one plan about foreign players – to naturalise these players,” Lopetegui explains. UAE drew on mainly Brazilian-born talent naturalised after spending five years there. They’d thrashed Qatar 5-0 and 3-1 in the year before Lopetegui took over. But he got Qatar organised. “We overcame them in the play-off, 2-1. All the country is very, very happy but now the expectations are above the real situation.” 

He’s raised expectations. “It’s true. But we are a country where we have 300,000 passport [holders] – and not all of them play football.” Qatar has deepened its playing stock with those with ancestry in Senegal, Ghana, Belgium, Brazil, Portugal and Uruguay. Hosting the 2022 World Cup accelerated Qatari passion for the game. “It’s true that the country loves football, the country is improving a lot, we have incredible facilities,” Lopetegui adds. “But the biggest facility that one coach has is the players.

“The level of our league is very different to other leagues. And we have a big problem that no other country has. Many of our players don’t get playing time in local teams because their positions are occupied by foreign players. That’s why we have to focus on every small detail to maximise their performance and remain competitive.”

He changed training to accommodate Ramadan, the period when Muslims fast in daylight. “We have to adapt to take care of them. We have one nutritionist very close of them, to fulfil in the best way the respecting of Ramadan. The training session is very late. They start at 8.30pm. The biorhythm is different. They sleep when we wake up.”

He loves their desire to achieve. “We speak in English with them. There is someone that doesn’t talk English well, but always we have one translator about to talk Arabic. The players have a big will to improve, knowing our level is not maybe the same as the other teams in the World Cup. We know that most teams are very happy when they draw Qatar in their group. We have to work hard to have the big dream to compete and surprise them in the World Cup.

“For that, we have one plan now until June – big friendly tests. We’re playing Serbia and Argentina, Ireland and Paraguay to be the most competitive possible for the first match against Switzerland.”

Qatar play the Swiss in San Francisco on June 13, Canada in Vancouver on June 18, and then the European play-off A winner – either Bosnia and Herzegovina, Italy, Northern Ireland or Wales – in Seattle on June 24.

The World Cup is a big dream for Lopetegui as well as his players. He went to USA 94 with Spain as back-up keeper to Andoni Zubizarreta and Santiago Canizares and never played. He coached Spain to Russia 2018 but news leaked that he’d negotiated a post-tournament move to Real Madrid and the Spanish FA dismissed him 48 hours before their first game. “It’s true that happened. We were very close to managing Spain in Russia.”

He looks back with pride on the work he did in qualification. “We did two incredible years with Spain. We didn’t have any defeat in 20 matches, playing against the best teams around the world: England in England [Wembley]; Italy in Italy [Juventus Stadium]; Belgium in Belgium [Brussels]; and France, who became world champions, in France [Stade de France].

“We were ready to have a very good performance in Russia, but OK, the  thing happened. We need to accept that.”

Third time lucky? I ask Lopetegui. He finally gets to influence a game at the World Cup. “It’s true that when we came to Qatar one part of our mind was: ‘why not achieve one big dream? Be in a World Cup.’ We achieved it.”

Lopetegui and Qatar will be based in beautiful Montecito, California. “We have one airport very close to our hotel. One hour 15 minutes to San Francisco, two hours [Seattle], two and a half [Vancouver]. Travel’s not so bad.”

He’s relaxed about the weather, recalling 1994. “We were with Spain in Chicago, Boston and New York, similar weather. Dallas was crazy, crazy hot. Now we will be in the best places for the weather: San Francisco, Seattle and Vancouver.”

FIFA has determined that there will be rehydration breaks – useful for coaches wanting to pass on tactical instructions. “You can be closer to give them different orders to change things. We did this many times in the pandemic. Always the coaches, we want to have this. But it depends! If you ask me in one match, I can say, ‘it’s good for us to stop’. Sometimes you prefer ‘don’t stop!’”

Lopetegui has a bigger concern. “Do you know one of the bigger risks there? A lightning storm. If you have any lightning in two hours around you, you have to cancel the training session there. Now we don’t have the risk in this, I hope.”

Lopetegui laughs when I mention that England players need a games room and entertainment in their downtime between tournament games. “This is the same around the world! Players have to have different distractions! With our players, it’s a little bit different because they have big discipline and pride in their religion [their daily prayers]. But otherwise it is very, very similar how they use their free time when they are in the hotel as a group.”

He continues to follow English football. “I’ve watched the last matches in the Premier League and it was raining, raining and raining! I was watching Wolves against Arsenal [on February 18], looking at the rain and talking with my wife, ‘OK, we have a different life now!’ The sun is shining here!”

He looks back with pride on his time at Wolves and slight frustration. “When we arrive there, we had one agreement to put out relegation [stay up] and then make one different plan.” He’d keep Wolves up and the board would then strengthen the squad in the 2023 summer transfer window. “They didn’t fulfil this for different reasons and we decided to close our time with them, to have one agreement and to say, ‘thank you, but it’s not our agreement that we were told before’. But I have very, very big memories with Wolves, big memories about the city, the fans, the incredible support for me, their incredible respect for me. That’s why always I will love them. I wish the best always to them.”

As for West Ham, Lopetegui lasted 22 games in 2024-25 before being dismissed on January 8 with the team still seven points above the drop zone. “Looking what happened now, I think that we were not bad. If people look back with perspective. We were 14th.” He’d wanted to strengthen the defence in January. “The winter market was very important for us. We knew our players much better and knew what was the right movement to improve the team. But they decided to finish our agreement. It was a pity for me because I think the players were very, very convinced about our way to work.”

He has no regrets. “I love English football. I love the Premier League. It is by far the best competition around the world for many, many reasons. The main reason is the environment and the passion of the fans.”

So will we see him back in England one day? “Why not?!” Lopetegui replies. “For sure, one of my aims in the future is to come back to the Premier League again. But now we have a big, big aim in front of us – to go to one World Cup. My dream.”