As the waves crash against the harbour walls of West Hoe Pier, a Grade II-listed structure beneath Plymouth’s Grand Parade, Miron Muslic’s mind turns to the sights and sounds of spring 1992 in Bihac, Bosnia. He was a typical nine-year-old boy, happiest having a kickabout or watching He-Man, still on a high from getting a BMX for his birthday months earlier. “We became refugees overnight,” he says. “We faced a genocide in the heart of Europe. You fear for your life, you’re scared. It was just devastating. We had to grab everything we could put in a bag and move 700km [435 miles]. I don’t think I was really aware of what was going on. How could I be?”
Muslic, his younger sister, Marinela, and their parents, Camil and Mersada, fled to Austria via Hungary, eventually arriving in the scenic Pertisau am Achensee after a few days on the road via various modes of transport. “And from there, Austria became our second home,” he says.
He enjoyed an amateur playing career and pursued management, born from intrigue in Jürgen Klopp’s Borussia Dortmund. “It always felt like they were playing with 13 players. ‘How is this possible?’” First there were the baby steps coaching under‑10s in Gmunden, a town an hour east of Salzburg, and last season big strides with Cercle Brugge, whom he led to the Europa League qualifying third round in August.
Ralf Rangnick, Roger Schmidt, Diego Simeone and Oliver Glasner have also influenced Muslic. Glasner started his career at Ried, where Muslic also had his first taste of frontline management. This Sunday Muslic’s Plymouth side host Liverpool in the FA Cup fourth round. Arne Slot is another major inspiration. “Growing up, this scenario felt so far away it was almost untouchable. From time to time I might tell my players something from my experience to support and help them. But when they hear my story they don’t have to stand there and start crying or feel sorry for me.”
Muslic’s father worked as a waiter in resort hotels in Tirol, his mother as a cleaner. He recalls the sacrifice his parents made and the struggles they faced to pay electric bills, monthly rent and education fees. The reason he could not go skiing with the rest of his class or attend Wienwoche, an annual festival in Vienna, dawned on him only as he grew older.
“But I had a happy childhood, I never had the feeling I missed out. We moved 13 or 14 times, Marinela and I changed schools 10 or 11 times; we had the life of a nomad family because my parents’ work was seasonal. I’m just glad I can recognise real life, because football is a bubble. I always try to relay this message to young players. Most of them only know about this bubble. It is a game we love and a privilege. So don’t waste it, don’t throw away your talent. Real life is a lot more difficult than playing a football game.”
Muslic and his family had to start from scratch. They shared a poky room in Innsbruck, in a block with other refugees from Bosnia, Croatia, Serbia and Turkey. “I guess it was the cheapest solution for us to have a roof over our heads,” he says, describing an arrangement with one bed, a wardrobe and a sink. “My father slept on the floor so Marinela, my mother and I could sleep [on the bed]. We shared the toilet and shower with strangers. There was no kitchen to prepare food; I was used to my mother’s cooking: stews, soup, pitta. I was used to singing in the shower, just enjoying it. But you couldn’t.”
They moved into a one-bedroom flat. Muslic and his sister slept on a sofa bed in the living room. “For us, it was like we had a mansion, having gone from one room to a little apartment. But the first day I woke up – I’ve always been an early bird, up at 6am, 7am – I saw a cockroach in the kitchen … I’ll never forget the smell. And we thought we were moving somewhere really nice.”
It explains Muslic’s interest in geopolitics and religion; he estimates he has read 150 books on everything from the former Yugoslavia and the collapse of the Soviet Union to the uprising in China and the history of the United States. He reels off a long list of former US presidents and is so engaging he could probably moonlight as a political leader. He has just finished reading Tariq Ali’s Shadows of the Pomegranate Tree. “It’s about the Spanish inquisition,” he says. Other favourites are Ildefonso Falcones’ Cathedral of the Sea and The Kite Runner by Khaled Hosseini, a story about two young boys from Afghanistan. “I like to understand why the world is thinking like it is, why the situations are like they are in Europe, America, Asia, the Middle East, to connect things a little bit.”
Muslic’s primary task after succeeding Wayne Rooney is to revive Plymouth, bottom of the Championship and four points from safety. This weekend, however, provides a different opportunity, with Slot and Liverpool in town. “When I was working in Belgium [at Cercle] I travelled twice to Rotterdam to watch Slot’s Feyenoord. I went on my days off to watch them live because I think he is unbelievable, the complete coach.
“At Feyenoord, his team was very dominant in possession but very intense out of it. It is the same at Liverpool. They don’t give you a second to breathe. At one point under pressure everything breaks and that is the moment they intercept, steal the ball and then find one of their forwards capable of doing something special.”
He giggles in excitement. The 42-year-old was in the stands for Plymouth’s win at Brentford in the previous round – when Kevin Nancekivell, the popular first-team coach awarded the freedom of the city last month, led the team – before heading to Devon for the first time. “I think the idea of the people in charge of Argyle was to protect me by putting me on a train with 2,500 of the Green Army,” he says, smiling. “They offered me wine, vodka, beer, cola, water, doughnuts … I only accepted a doughnut.” By that point Muslic was well versed on his new club. He had analysed 10 games in full, dived into the data and wowed the Plymouth hierarchy with a detailed presentation during talks in London.
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Neither party could dress up the numbers: no team have conceded more goals across the top four divisions this season and Plymouth have taken 51 points from their past 51 league matches. But victory against West Brom last weekend ended a 15-game run without a league win and Muslic is determined to avoid dropping into League One. “It is a hell of a task but it’s not impossible,” he says. “All of my life I have been chasing challenges, never running away from things.”
How, then, do Plymouth prepare to host arguably the best team in the world? “With bravery,” Muslic says, citing his players’ reaction to earn a point at promotion-chasing Sunderland three days after a 5-0 defeat at home to Burnley. “Otherwise you cannot compete. I’m not saying with courage and being brave we’re going to close the gap between Argyle and Liverpool, but you can get closer and make it more competitive. There is nothing to be afraid of.”
Muslic, whose wife, Ensada, and three children, Benjamin, Lejla and Hamza, are in Austria, does not want to waste a moment. His handshake is firm, his words convincing. Even the dead air plays a part; a clip of Muslic’s stirring address to Plymouth’s squad on his first day went viral. He insists it was not rehearsed but from the heart. “I think my past defines the person who I am today. I am the same coach as I am a person. I cannot be one coach and also another person. I’m not thinking about it [my past] every single day but is this my drive? Yeah, I have this inside my soul,” he says, tapping his chest. “I will never forget it.”
Another message sticks. “My father always told me to never go through life with a closed hand,” he says, clenching his left fist. “Maybe that way you can protect everything but nothing new will come in. If your hand is open, you will lose some things but new things will always enter. That is the mentality for the Liverpool game. I dreamed about watching Liverpool at Anfield but to be in the dugout managing against one of them, that’s fantasy. And I don’t read fantasy.”
There is a flash of lightning outside. “My first days here were sunny but as soon as I signed my contract, it started raining and everything,” he says, laughing. It will not stop Muslic immersing himself in his new surroundings, aided by the “30 Walks in Devon” cards given to him by the club secretary, Zac Newton, after he shared his love of the outdoors. “I try to escape, hide, breathe,” he says. “There are other things in life than preparing a gameplan for the next opponent.”
