Chiefly remembered more as a famous coach than as a player, he became coach of Sparta Prague for the first time in the 1960s, going on to transform the team and win two Czechoslovak titles, in 1965 and 1967. After this success, he left Czechoslovakia and moved to the Netherlands. From 1969 to 1972, he coached ADO Den Haag, leading them to third place in the Dutch league, before taking over as head coach of Czechoslovakia's national team. He created a new team of talented players including Ivo Viktor, Alexander Vencel, Antonín Panenka, Ladislav Jurkemik, Zdeněk Nehoda, Anton Ondruš, Jaroslav Pollák and Ján Pivarník. The team won the European Championships in 1976, beating West Germany in a penalty shoot-out in the final, but failed to qualify for the 1978 World Cup Finals. Ježek was replaced as head coach by his assistant Jozef Vengloš.