A few years ago Louis van Gaal was invited to appear on Sky Sports as a studio pundit. Possibly knowing that an appearance fee and a free trip to London might not be enough to convince the great man, it was suggested to him that this could be an opportunity to gain a “better profile” in the Premier League. “No, thank you,” Van Gaal said. “I’m quite happy with my bad profile.”

It was a fitting response from a no-nonsense man for whom public relations are anathema. Few would question that the Dutch manager has a “difficult” personality. The question is to what degree that personality is part of his success or whether, on the contrary, it has been a hindrance.

“I am who I am and I have my own ways,” he said in an interview with Fifa.com in 2008. “I’m not going to change and I have no desire to.” Such statements may partly explain why he has been out of the limelight since leaving his post as technical director of Ajax in 2004, after a row with Ronald Koeman, the coach at the time.

But Van Gaal is one of the few for whom the tag of “managerial genius” has any meaning. His brilliance at understanding the game — if not always those who play it — is such that he was bound to come back in a big way.

He walked into Alkmaar in the summer of 2005 and finished second and third in his first two seasons. After a dip last year, his side stormed back this season to win the Dutch title by an 11-point margin. It was the first time in 28 years that a team other than Ajax, PSV Eindhoven or Feyenoord became champions of the Netherlands. And it was enough for the world to take notice; next season he will take over at Bayern Munich.

The nuptials of Aloysius Paulus Maria van Gaal and the club formerly known as Hollywood FC, a place where nobody is afraid to speak his mind, promises to be volatile. After all, this is a man who in his first spell at Barcelona, won two titles and a Spanish Cup but resigned at the end of his third season after seemingly alienating everyone. A national team coach who fell out with the bulk of his squad and failed to take a gifted Holland team to the 2002 World Cup finals. A person who, upon his return to Barcelona, rowed his way through six turbulent months before being shown the door.

Yet Van Gaal is also the architect of the legendary Ajax sides of the early 1990s, a team capable of reaching two Champions League finals — beating Fabio Capello’s AC Milan in one of them. That side offered up a stunning brand of creative, attacking football. He recreated the magic at the Nou Camp, this time with Rivaldo and Luís Figo flanking Patrick Kluivert in a stellar front three. But it was at Barcelona that the world realised that Van Gaal’s genius came at a price. His belief in tactical rigour brought him into conflict with many of his players and his inability to relate his ideas to the local media and the fans meant the side always seemed on the verge of imploding.

His critics depicted him as a kind of footballing zealot, a man wedded to his tactical dogma. And while there may be some truth in that charge, the end product was beautiful, successful football. And that may be what sets Van Gaal apart. He was among the first who saw tactical rigour not just as a tool for minimising your weaknesses and maximising your strengths, but as a vehicle for creating something truly special. In Van Gaal’s world, the star of his Barcelona side wasn’t Rivaldo or Figo, it was his self-described 2-3-2-3 system, which the players struggled to come to terms with, and which nobody since has successfully implemented.

If football were a religion, Van Gaal would be a true believer, an ayatollah. That’s not necessarily a bad thing, if the end result is beauty and innovation. And if the price is his sometimes prickly personality, it’s worth paying.

And another thing...

Viewers the losers from end-of-season schedule

On Saturday, Inter Milan and Barcelona were crowned champions of Italy and Spain respectively. They did so without kicking a ball, because their closest opponents were defeated, AC Milan going down away to Udinese and Real Madrid losing away to Villarreal. Maybe it’s just me, but there’s something depressing about winning a title without stepping on to the pitch.

Obviously broadcasters and the huge amounts they pay for TV rights take precedence, but surely there must be a better way, such as flexible scheduling late in the season. With a bit of common sense, everyone would benefit. The same applies to the Barclays Premier League: wouldn’t Newcastle United v Fulham have been a more appealing TV option than Chelsea v Blackburn Rovers?

TV network’s own goal

Speaking of Barcelona, they moved a step closer to the treble last Wednesday, pummelling Athletic Bilbao 4-1 to win the Spanish Cup.

But the headlines that night were made by the broadcaster, TVE, Spain’s state-run network. Before the game, when both sets of fans began booing the Spanish anthem in the name of Catalan and Basque nationalism, the broadcast cut away to images of milquetoast fans in the two cities. Evidently, the director did not want sport and politics to mix, which, I guess, is fair enough.

But things went from bad to worse when it did eventually air the anthem, albeit heavily doctored, with the fans faded down and the music faded up, so as to drown out any dissent. TVE’s head of sport has resigned over the affair, and rightly so.