KUALA LUMPUR, May 23 — Newly appointed national head coach Nelo Vingada from Portugal is reported to have arrived in Kuala Lumpur to start his duties as the national team’s head coach.

The arrival of Vingada or popularly known as ‘The Professor’ was uploaded in the Football Association of Malaysia’s official Facebook, which also carried a picture of the Portugese coach with FAM president Tunku Ismail Sultan Ibrahim.

"Nelo Vingada who is very committed and eager to start his new job, want to start his duties immediately,” according to the posting in the Facebook.

Vingada’s first major assignment would be to prepare the National squad to face Lebanon in their 2019 Asia Cup Qualifying match on June 13, after the Asian Football Confederation (AFC) had decided to postpone Malaysia’s Group B match against North Korea to Oct 5.

The other team in Group B is Hong Kong. 

Vingada, 64, started his coaching career as assistant to Carlos Queiroz who was the head coach of the Portugal Under-20 squad that was successful in the 1989 and 1991 FIFA Under-20 World Cup.

After taking over from Queiroz as the head coach, Vingada guided Portugal to the semifinals of the 1995 FIFA Under-20 World Cup in 1995 and the 1996 Olympics.

Vingada who has about 35 years of coaching experience under his belt is also no stranger to Asia since he had coached the Saudi Arabian youth squad in (1996-97), Egypt Olympic team (2004-05), Jordan National team (2007-09) and Iran Olympic team in (2014).

Other clubs coached by Vingada are FC Zamalek (Egypt), FC Seoul (S. Korea), Persepolis FC (Iran), Dalian Shide FC (China) and lastly NorthEast United FC (India). — Bernama