Otto Barić (; 19 June 1933 – 13 December 2020) was an Austrian-Croatian professional football player and manager.
Coaching career
1970s to 1980s
Born in Eisenkappel, near Klagenfurt, Barić started his coaching career in 1969 at West German club Germania Wiesbaden and moved after one season to Austrian club Wacker Innsbruck, where he spent next two seasons and won two consecutive league champions titles before moving to LASK Linz in July 1972. After two seasons with Linz, he went on to coach Croatian club NK Zagreb and spent two seasons there before moving to Dinamo Vinkovci in July 1976. In the late 1970s, he was also the head coach of the Yugoslav amateur national team, a team that consisted of players from the Yugoslav Second League, and won two regional and one continental title with the team between 1976 and 1978. At the same time, he spent almost four seasons at Dinamo Vinkovci before returning to Austria in March 1980 to coach Sturm Graz. He spent one and a half seasons with Sturm and was then unemployed for a year before starting to coach Rapid Wien in July 1982. He led Rapid to three champions titles in the Austrian Bundesliga in 1982, 1983 and 1987, as well as to three Austrian Cup titles in 1983, 1984 and 1985. In 1985, he also led Rapid to the final match of the UEFA Cup Winners' Cup, but lost the title with a 3–1 defeat against Everton.
Barić left Rapid for German club VfB Stuttgart in the summer of 1985 and coached the team until March 1986. After three months without a job, he returned to Rapid in June 1986 and went on to coach the team in the following two seasons, winning another Austrian Cup title in 1987. After leaving Rapid in June 1988, he was unemployed for five months before eventually continuing to work as the head coach of Sturm Graz between November 1988 and June 1989.
1990s
After leaving Sturm, Barić became head coach of SK Vorwärts Steyr, another team of the Austrian Bundesliga, for the 1990–91 season. In July 1991, he was engaged by Austria Salzburg. He led Austria Salzburg to two consecutive champions titles in the Austrian Bundesliga in 1994 and 1995, and also managed to qualify for the UEFA Champions League in 1994, thus making Austria Salzburg the first Austrian club to do that. The team finished third in their group behind Ajax Amsterdam and A.C. Milan. In the previous 1993–94 season, he led the club to the two-legged final of the UEFA Cup, but lost the title to Inter Milan with a 2–0 defeat on aggregate. He coached the Salzburg team until August 1995 and then he left due to differences of opinion between him and some players.
He was jobless for a short time after leaving Austria Salzburg and then he worked as an assistant coach in the Croatia national team until the end of the 1996 European Championship. In July 1996, he became the head coach of Dinamo Zagreb and led the club to titles in both the Croatian First League and Croatian Cup in only one season he coached the team. In June 1997, he left Dinamo for Turkish club Fenerbahçe, where he worked until March 1999. Barić was then unemployed for a couple of months after leaving Fenerbahçe and subsequently returned to his international career as the head coach of the Austria national team between 1999 and 2001, giving up his position after Austria failed to qualify for the 2002 World Cup finals.
2000s
In January 2002, he went on to coach Austria Salzburg for four months and was then jobless for two months until July 2002, when he was named the head coach of the Croatia national team after his predecessor Mirko Jozić was dismissed due to unsuccessful campaign of the team at the 2002 World Cup finals.