Clive Charles
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Clive Charles (October 3, 1951-August 26, 2003) was a football player and coach.
Charles was born in London. In 1970, he began his 12-year professional soccer career as a player for West Ham United, playing the position of defender. After a few seasons, he began playing with Cardiff City instead.
In 1978, he went to the United States to play in the now-defunct North American Soccer League (NASL). The bulk of his NASL career was spent with the Portland Timbers. Although he later played with other teams, he returned to Portland, Oregon after retiring from the NASL. After returning to Portland, he began his coaching career, coaching soccer for a high school in Troutdale, Oregon. In 1986, he got a coaching job with the University of Portland, and began to coach the men's team there. In 1989, he began to coach both the men's and women's teams at UP. He would continue coaching the UP teams until his death. In his last season (2002), the UP women's team won the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) championship.
Charles also spent several years as coach of the U.S. men's national team, guiding it to the 2000 Summer Olympics; also, he was assistant coach of the U.S. team in the 1998 World Cup.
He died of prostate cancer.
