Kaizer Chiefs and Stuart Baxter have reached an agreement that will see the former Finnish National Coach take the coaching reigns at Amakhosi.

Baxter, who is familiar with the South African football landscape, was introduced to the Kaizer Chiefs Board today and received a tour of the Kaizer Chiefs Village, his new home. The newly appointed Head Coach was last in the country as Head Coach for Bafana Bafana in 2004 and 2005 after coaching the English Under-19 side in 2002. He also coached the Finland National team in 2008 until 2010.

The Executive Chairman has been eager to make appointments for the Head of the Technical Team ahead of the new PSL Season and will be making more announcements before the end of the week.

“It’s a great pleasure to announce Stuart Baxter as the new Kaizer Chiefs Coach. He will fit in well into our strategy going forward because of his great wealth of knowledge at the Club, National team and at an International level. His expertise as far as mentoring coaches as a coaching instructor will assist us in developing our own coaches and will also help a great deal in developing our youth academy”, said Executive Chairman, Kaizer Motaung.

Baxter expressed his delight to be back in South Africa to be coaching a team of Kaizer Chiefs’ calibre. “I’m very happy to be taking up this challenging but exciting project at Kaizer Chiefs”.

Kaizer Chiefs would like to welcome Mr Baxter to the Amakhosi Family and urge the supporters to support the Coach and his Technical Staff in the new season.

Baxter, who is of both Scottish and English descent has travelled the globe and is known for his keen interest in working under different cultural climates. Stuart Baxter also has an extensive playing history as a midfielder for teams in Scotland, Australia, Sweden, the United States and England. He has managed clubs in Norway, Portugal, Japan, and Sweden where he was credited for guiding Swedish team AIK to the Championship. His most recent post was held as an advisor to Swedish AIK’s current Manager, Andreas Alm.

He has won a cup or the league with the clubs he has coached in the past. Some of his other achievements are at AIK in Stockholm where he was the only coach to take the team to the group stages in the Champions League where the team played against Barcelona, Fiorentina, Arsenal and Helsingborgs in Sweden. He led the team to the Europa League last 16.

Baxter’s Coaching Career:

1985 Orebro SK, Sweden

1986 Skarp IF, Tromso, Norway

1987 Vittoria Setubal, Portugal

1988 – 1991 Halmstad BK, Sweden

1992 – 1994 Sanfreece Hiroshima, Japan

1995 – 1997 Vissel Kobe, Japan

1998 – 2000 AIK Stockholm, Sweden

2001 F.C. Lynn Oslo, Norway