At the end of August every year, the attention of the world's media focused on Monaco's Grimaldi Forum.
The Champions League Group Stage draw and UEFA awards ceremony held there attracted the attention of media and fans worldwide.
Yet few people noticed that in early September each year, after the Champions League draw, UEFA's headquarters in Nyon, Switzerland, also hosted a crucial summit for Head Coaches—the UEFA Elite Coaches Summit.
Founded in 1999, this official summit for professional coaches was regarded as the highest authority in the world of football management. Only the best-performing and most outstanding coaches in European football the previous season were eligible to attend.
The Elite Coaches Summit was not well known. Many fans had never even heard of it. Yet its influence on European football was by no means weak, because many major changes in the past had originated at this summit.
For example, there were the refereeing issues discussed several years ago and implemented over the past few years, as well as last year's proposals to unify transfer windows across the major leagues and abolish the away-goals rule in UEFA competitions.
These proposals had received UEFA's attention. Many had already been implemented, bringing about major changes in European football.
But hardly anyone knew about any of this, because Head Coaches had never been the protagonists of European football.
That changed this year. The invitation extended to the protagonist of world football brought this elite summit, which had never received much attention from the media or fans, into the public eye and attracted worldwide attention.
That protagonist was Yang Yang!
After taking home UEFA's Season's Best Player and Best Forward awards in Monaco, Yang Yang returned to Madrid. He did not rest for even two days before flying to Nyon, Switzerland, to attend UEFA's