Spanish football’s influence is travelling well beyond its players. Across the 2025/26 season, 107 Spanish coaches worked for clubs in the top two divisions of leagues within the major confederations, underlining a growing overseas market for technical staff trained in Spain.
The figure places Spain comfortably first among the exporting nations. Portugal had 53 coaches working abroad at that level, while Italy recorded 40.
Quick facts
- 107 Spanish coaches worked in the first or second tiers of major confederations in 2025/26.
- Spain led Portugal, with 53, and Italy, with 40.
- Within UEFA countries outside Spain, 74 Spanish coaches were employed.
- That European total included 54 in first divisions and 20 in second divisions.
- The comparable figure one season earlier was 63.
The European numbers show the pace of the shift. Seventy-four Spaniards held coaching posts in the top two levels of another UEFA nation during 2025/26, rising from 63 a year earlier. Of the current total, 54 were in the highest division and 20 in the second tier.
For years, Spain’s export story centred on academy graduates and established players moving into leading foreign leagues. Coaches are now becoming part of the same cross-border flow, with Spanish-trained staff finding opportunities that may be harder to secure at home.
The appeal has been shaped by coaching education, match analysis and experience in youth development. More specialised backroom teams have also helped broaden the profile of Spanish football professionals beyond the familiar image of a manager shaped solely by LaLiga.
It is not only head coaches who benefit from that reputation. Analysts and other technical specialists formed in Spanish club structures are increasingly looking abroad when domestic openings are limited. Spain’s academy system, long judged by the talent it sends onto the pitch, is also supplying the dugouts and staff rooms of the wider European game.
