up the Assistant Manager role at Zakho FC working with Marian Mihail. In February 2017, he was initially announced as Head Coach of Forest Rangers. Forest chairperson Benhail Mukuka said the club was excited to have signed Marinica, who comes with success from his stint in Tanzania. However shortly afterwards, Perry Mutapa was announced instead, with the club not elaborating over the reversal of the appointment. September 2017 saw him join Ion Moldovan's technical staff at Romanian premier division team Concordia Chiajna. In 2019, he joined as the Technical Director of the Indian Super League club Kerala Blasters FC and its youth academy and their reserve squad. He spoke about the programme and his vision for developing football from the grassroots level. Under the new Technical Director, all youth teams as well as the reserve teams are training under the same philosophy. This approach will make the player transition smoother and easier during promotions to higher teams. On 7 March 2020, Kerala Blasters Reserves beat Gokulam FC in the final of Kerala Premier League (KPL) at Calicut Corporation Stadium to lift the first trophy in their short history. Marinica was also appointed by the All India Football Federation as a Grassroots Football Technical Panel Member through to the end of 2021. Malawi November 2021 saw Marinica appointed as Technical Director of the Football Association of Malawi on a three-year contract. Speaking at the appointment, Football Association of Malawi President Walter Nyamilandu commented "He is here to develop Malawi football and to correct some shortfalls that are there. As an association, we want to play football the right way. We need to produce quality coaches who will take Malawian football to another level. There has always been a gap especially when playing international games so Mario is here to bridge the gap. We don’t want shortcuts and we want to be better organized as he champions the agenda of football development. I want to live behind a football philosophy that will suit our nation. We need to embrace change. With him, I expect technical issues to be the number one priority by paying more attention to grassroots football and youth football before bringing everything together for the betterment of our game. Mario comes into this position with lots of experience and is not new in this environment. He has worked in Africa and his profile on the continent is well documented,"