Sampaoli's climb to respectability not quite finished

BUENOS AIRES - Argentina coach Jorge Sampaoli's career got a leg up when he was spotted up a tree barking instructions to his hometown's amateur side.

The tree offered the best vantage point at a ground where there was no stand. That day, as was often the case, the referee had banished Sampaoli from the touchline for protesting.

The story goes that an executive at Newell's Old Boys saw a photograph of the budding coach up the tree in the local paper, liked Sampaoli's passion and offered him a job coaching Newells' second-division development club, Argentina de Rosario.