Robert Vilahamn's journey to Wembley has been about "patience"
Only taking on his first senior managerial role seven years ago, Vilahamn's journey has been a quick one, but also about smart decisions, according to former colleague and mentor Hakan Sandberg...
Robert Vilahamn has never been a man in a rush, carefully plotting his route through the managerial scenery in a way which doesn’t tally with the fast-tracked route which has ended with an FA Cup final in his first season in English football with Tottenham Hotspur.
When the Swede rocked up after a successful spell with BK Häcken as the latest Scandinavian import into the WSL manager market, it looked like a match made in heaven for the Spurs long-term project, with little eyes on instant success after escaping a relegation battle 12 months ago under now assistant Vicky Jepson.
But even before a historic run to Sunday’s showpiece occasion at Wembley, Vilahamn’s coaching methods had already made a big impact in North London, guiding his team to several impressive results, mixed with the occasional drubbing, such as their 7-0 defeat at Manchester City.
That quick progress though was emphasised when Spurs beat the same opponent on penalties to reach the semi-finals, where another late goal secured their spot in the final against last year’s runners-up Manchester United this weekend.
Vilahamn’s coaching career has been eclectic, and is best described by Håkan Sandberg, a coach he worked with in the Swedish lower divisions, as both a player and an assistant coach at the same time.
Sandberg paints a picture of a model coach, a “clever guy” and someone “nobody has anything bad to say about”, yet Vilahamn himself in the past has admitted being far from the model professional as a youngster, wasting his own playing career with a poor lifestyle.
In some ways it makes his successful coaching career something of an enigma, and that stretches as far as his identity, originally Jan Robert Karlsson, embracing the name Robert, while Vilahamn is a mix of Vilhelmina and Skalhamn, the two small towns he and his wife grew up in.
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Skalhamn, Vilahamn’s birthplace, inhabits just 135 people and you could fit the population into Wembley this weekend 607 times over. His dad worked in the local harbour while his mum helped to support he and his six siblings, another of whom went on to be a professional footballer and is now an agent.
Vilahamn has channelled his failings as a player, where he lived an unhealthy lifestyle after moving to the big city of Gothenburg to play for one of Sweden’s biggest clubs, into how he is as a coach, but he’s needed a helping hand from the likes of Sandberg along the way.
In a playing career which was petering out, Vilahamn joined Ytterby IS in the third division in 2007, but his love for playing was long past being on the wane, and in 2009 he became a player-assistant coach alongside Martin Berggren, before Sandberg took over as a manager a couple of years later.
“That was 2012 I think it was, so 12 years ago now,” recalls Sandberg. “You could see straight away he was a clever boy. He was intelligent and a little more mature than the others, he would have been coming up to being 30 and in a different part of his career to many.
“In those days I didn’t see so much of the coaching skills. He was helping me, but it was lower division and it wasn’t that much work. As a player, he was clever too and as a leader in the group he was fantastic that way. He was my captain, he took care of all the boys in the team.”
Admitting previously the only influences he has taken into coaching have been from his own failings as a player, Vilahamn was showing the talent which could have made him a Swedish superstar, winning several golden boot awards in the lower leagues while concentrating on his future as a head coach.
“I knew very quickly he was a little more intelligence and engaged than the other players,” continues Sandberg. “He started his own academy in Africa, he was doing things as if he was 45 rather than 30!
“He was just a nice guy, very clever. We worked together for three years and he stopped playing just after I left Ytterby.”
When he did hang up his boots, he spent only a little more time with Ytterby before taking on a role as U19s head coach of Örgryte IS, where he made an impact winning the U19s league, before becoming the head coach of Qviding FIF, who had just been demoted from the third tier to the fifth tier after going into bankruptcy, but who Vilahamn had a previous attachment to from his playing days.
“When he was in Qviding I was sort of a mentor for him because I’m much older than him and my coaching career was over,” says Sandberg, now 65. “I followed his progress there and it was the same things. He showed the same traits, that he was hard working, very friendly, I never met anyone who had something bad to say about Rob.
“He’s worth everything and lately his coaching career has gone very quick in my eyes, but of course he’s ready for it. He went from BK Häcken as an assistant and then coach for the women’s team to England, I really love that he has got this chance in England.”
Sandberg admits he “saw that” in Vilahamn when I ask about his talent as a coach even as a man in his early thirties and having never been a head coach until 2018, less than six years later he will lead a team out at Wembley on Sunday afternoon.
While it may seem like it’s been rushed, it’s more a testament to his talents as a coach and some smart decision making along the way.
“I remember the first year I was sort of a mentor to him we would meet up and go for coffees in the centre of Gothenburg. He was working in a school as a teacher as well as a few other projects, but he was dreaming of being a coach full-time and in Qviding he couldn’t do that, so he was a teacher too, and generally if you’re a teacher you’re quite smart!
“But he always showed how much he wanted it and I was just waiting for a bigger club to find him. BK Häcken is a big team in Sweden. He was an assistant with the men and then took over the women’s team. He took his years to learn, you are not ready to take a team like that when you are 30. I said to him ‘yes, take the chance, learn how it is in a big team’ and he did. He has come through very quick since.”
As an assistant in 2020, he helped BK Häcken qualify for the Europa Conference League before taking the reins of the women’s team towards the end of 2021, finishing second in the league.
He guided the side to another second place in 2022 behind Swedish giants FC Rosengård before going toe to toe with Hammarby in 2023 until Tottenham Hotspur came calling last summer.
Vilahamn also helped guide BK Häcken to back-to-back Swedish Cup finals but again had to settle for silver in both, meaning this weekend would be his first major trophy as a coach, but will have to get past Manchester United to do so.
He is not defined by his trophies though, certainly not in North London where he has become an instant hit and on his way to building something special for the future, and if not will no doubt have done enough already to attract the attention of potential suitors elsewhere.
Whatever happens, Sandberg believes his smart decision making and intelligence means he will always find himself in the right places at the right times, and the silverware will eventually come with it.
“He got what he deserved, that’s for sure. In my view, he has done so far a perfect coaching career because he has made very clever choices.
“I have followed him very closely and even years ago he had choices, he could have been head coach for a top division team in Sweden, but I said take your time and this chance will come later.
“Then he got the women’s team in BK Häcken and that was a big decision for him, but it was a clever decision. As I keep saying, he’s a clever guy!”