He held his position for the Kerkrade-based club for 12 years, serving under head coaches Bert Jacobs (1974–1980), Piet de Visser (1980–1983), Hans Eijkenbroek (1983–1984) and Frans Körver (1984–1986).
During the last managerial change, Gerards replaced Eikenbroek as interim coach for a single game in December 1984, before returning to his post under arriving manager Frans Körver for the remainder of the 1984−85 season.
At the start of the 1985−86 season, Gerards assumed his first job as head coach for an ambitious Greek Alpha Ethniki side OFI, based in Heraklion, Crete.
[1] The club had recently been acquired by the rich and prestigious Vardinogiannis family, who also were the major shareholders of Athens-based regular Greek champions, Panathinaikos.
In his first season with the club, Gerards had turned OFI into a serious competitor for traditional Greek football "giants" Panathinaikos, AEK Athens, Olympiacos and PAOK.
In 1987, Gerards led the club to its first, and to this day only major honour, winning the Greek Football Cup in a penalty shoot-out vs. Iraklis Thessaloniki during the competition Final.
[5] After two seasons, Gerards decided in 2004 to retire as football manager and re-assumed his role as technical director and scout at AEK Athens, a position he held until 2009.
[5] Eugène was the son of Johanna Gerards-Dedroeg and Joep Gerards (1906–1986), a former Dutch footballer who played for various top-level Limburgian clubs during the 1920s and 1930s, as well as the president of SV Limburgia during 1946–1973.
Characteristic of his love for Crete, he acquired Greek citizenship, and began his own winery "Geraldakis",[5] a name he himself created and often used in public appearances by appending the common Cretan patronymic suffix -akis[broken anchor] to his own Dutch surname.
A friendly game was held in his honor in 2000 at the club's home ground Theodoros Vardinogiannis Stadium, in which he later was offered a permanent, leather seat with his name engraved on it.