Good wife is best thing to happen to footballer: Scolari

Brazilian football coach Luiz Felipe ‘Big Phil’ Scolari has said that the best thing that can ever happen to a football player is a “good wife”.

Scolari, 60, slammed the culture that involves cash, flashy cars, nightclubs, and WAGs, insisting that they could put the players and their careers in trouble.

The manager of the Premier League side Chelsea also warned players against using up their huge pay packets on luxuries because their careers are so short.

“The best thing for a player in their football life is to have a good wife,” the Daily Star quoted Scolari as saying. “If a player has a good wife, you don’t need to worry about him.

“Today, if a player is intelligent, they have money for their family for the second generation and even the fifth generation. But some players don’t think about this. Some players only think about today, spending money for the day, spending money on a car, nights out, and on this and on that.

“After 10 years they have spent a lot of money, too much money, and they have killed the life.”

Scolari, who won the World Cup as Brazil's manager in 2002, had grown up poor in his home country, but he now earns £6 million a year to manage the Blues. He has been married to his wife Olga for 33 years.

The only difference between Olga, 53, and the WAGs of English football is that Olga is well educated and has made her own living.