[6] He only featured for Den Haag once more that season,[6] and that summer, the San Francisco Golden Gate Gales franchise imported the Den Haag team, which included Advocaat, to play for six weeks in the United Soccer Association as part of an effort to make the sport more popular in the United States.

[6] In 1978, Advocaat made the move to the United States to play with the Chicago Sting in the North American Soccer League (NASL).

[10] During the break between the 1979 and 1980 NASL seasons, Advocaat returned to the Netherlands and made 11 appearances, scoring one goal, for his former club, FC Den Haag.

[13] In 1984, Advocaat was unexpectedly appointed as assistant to Netherlands national team head coach Rinus Michels.

[5] In 1990, Advocaat once more became an assistant to Michels, who was having his fourth spell as coach of the Dutch national team and looking to qualify for UEFA Euro 1992.

[26] Advocaat returned to coaching at club level with PSV on 16 December 1994, taking over from interim manager Kees Rijvers.

[31] Over the summer, Advocaat signed Jaap Stam, and in the 1996–97 season, PSV won the Eredivisie title and qualified for the UEFA Champions League the following year.

[33] In 1998, Advocaat accepted the invitation from Rangers chairman David Murray to become the Scottish Premier League (SPL) team's new manager.

[36] Long-term members of the squad that had won nine league championships in a row left,[35] including Ally McCoist, Ian Durrant, Andy Goram and Stuart McCall.

[35] Big money signings such as Giovanni van Bronckhorst, Arthur Numan and Andrei Kanchelskis were among Advocaat's first as Rangers tried to regain the league championship.

Despite investment in the team with players such as Tore André Flo for a record £12 million,[45] Rangers failed to win any trophies, as Celtic under new manager Martin O'Neill won the domestic treble.

[47] After good results against Sturm Graz[48] and Monaco,[49] the club failed to qualify for the next phase of the competition, finishing third behind Galatasaray on goal difference.

Shortly after the tournament, with mounting pressure and even death threats, Advocaat quit his job as head coach on 6 July 2004.

In early 2006, during the break between domestic seasons, Advocaat took a 23-man squad of players from the K-League and J-League and embarked on a five-week, ten-match tour.

Then they travelled to Hong Kong to take part in the Carlsberg Cup, where they defeated Croatia before losing in the final to Denmark.

They then travelled to America where they lost to Costa Rica, won against Major League Soccer (MLS) side LA Galaxy and Mexico.

[76] In December 2005, gas giant Gazprom took over as owners of Russian Premier League team Zenit Saint Petersburg.

[79] In December 2006, the Russian Premier League transfer record was broken twice, first with the signing of Pavel Pogrebnyak and then again when Zenit bought Alejandro Domínguez.

[93] In Europe, Zenit failed to advance from their Champions League group but finished third which meant they entered into the last 32 of the UEFA Cup.

[98] In the domestic season, Advocaat fielded seven foreign players in a team selection (one more than the league rules allow) against Lokomotiv Moscow in April 2009.

[citation needed] In May 2009, Advocaat agreed to become manager of the Belgium national team when his contract with Zenit expired on 1 January 2010.

[99] However, when Belgium failed to qualify for the 2010 World Cup, Franky Vercauteren resigned as manager and Advocaat's contract was brought forward to commence on 1 October 2009.

Advocaat only watched AZ's final group match of the Champions League on 9 December 2009, which Martin Haar managed.

Russia began the participation of Euro 2012 (Group A) promising by defeating the Czech Republic 4–1 and playing a 1–1 draw against hosts Poland.

[122] Advocaat began his new job with a win in the show competition 2012 Polish Masters, followed up by beating Ajax 4–2 to secure the 2012 Johan Cruyff Shield.

[139] He left the club a week later, announcing the end of his managerial career,[140] but reversed his decision to retire on 4 June 2015, signing a one-year contract with Sunderland.

[155] On 12 September FC Utrecht announced they had a verbal agreement with Advocaat to finish the 2018-2019 season, after their previous manager had been sacked after 4 games.

[156] On 30 October 2019, Feyenoord announced that Dick Advocaat was appointed as the club's coach for the remainder of the 2019–20 Eredivisie season after their previous manager Jaap Stam had resigned.

[160] On 1 August 2021, he was unveiled as the new head coach of Iraq national football team to lead them in the FIFA World Cup Qualifiers.

[164] On 15 January 2024, Advocaat was appointed as the new head coach of the Curaçao national football team, signing a one-year contract with an option for a further year.