Posts Tagged ‘2010 FIFA World Cup’

The nomad: A Football Manager story Part 1

Posted: February 6, 2012 by onefootinthegame in Uncategorized
Tags: , , , , , , , , , ,
2
Jan Breydel stadion en oefenvelden

Jan Breydel stadion en oefenvelden (Photo credit: Frank Van Hevel)

Chapter One: The end of the beginning

The knees. It’s always the knees.

It happened when I jumped up to get above Heskey early in the game, we were 2-0 up and cruising but I wanted big Emile Ivanhoe Heskey to know that even though he was 4 inches taller than me and at least 5 stone heavier I was going to beat him in the air.

I did.

I just didn’t land properly. I fell awkwardly and twisted my already torn knee ligaments.

I never played again. I was 28.

I didn’t want to know about football for months, a World Cup passed – I’d played in one for Italy and was due to play in another – but I couldn’t even watch. I lived alone and just sat around trying to find some solace.

I dabbled in a bit of commentary for ESPN but Ian Dowie and I had never gotten on, he’s just an idiot. A lovable idiot but still. I remember when he wanted to sign me at Newcastle, I laughed, he never forgave me and always slated me in the press.

I didn’t want to watch the Premier League, or Serie A. I’d won both and thought I could have added another at least, now they were just haunting me.

I did my coaching badges and ran away and this is my story. In my words.

I remember speaking to Roy Hodgson just before he got his dream job at Liverpool, he said: “Roberto, make sure you travel, you can learn lots about containing an opposing team by doing it in 4 or 5 countries. I mean if you can get the Swiss to run like clockwork, it will work anywhere won’t it?”

I wasn’t sure what to make of Roy’s comment, I mean the Swiss knew more about clockwork than anyone, I knew Roy was trying to be simple and profound, he always tried to be simple and profound, I was just missing it.

I decided he meant I should travel and manage across the world. Serie A, La Liga and the Bundesliga, those were my gospels now. After all I’ve got league winners medals, I’ve played in a World Cup and in a Champions League final – I’d walk into a job.

And so I did.

I just never expected it to be in Groningen, population 190,000; 50,000 of those were students. Jesus. Is this what winning a Champions League gets you?

At least their kit was nice.

The City was lovely, quiet and liberal. I could do whatever I wanted and fans wouldn’t even recognise me. It was like being in London but with more cheese.

First things first, I needed to assess the team, I tried to bring in my own backroom staff but the chairman wasn’t having it. I learnt the hard way that I’d never get on with Chairmen, more of that later, you give them the world and they’ll ask for Mars and Jupiter – that’s their problem. Never happy, like my ex- wife – at least she kissed me before she fucked me.

Anyway, the team I found was decent, Luciano was mad as a box of cats but what do you expect of a Brazilian keeper? I decided to bring in the wonderkid I’d seen at the Dallas Cup a few years before while scouting for Harry Redknapp, he was another Brazilian; Guilherme, he’d would become the best keeper in the world I knew he would.

In the midfield I was missing a real play maker, I liked to play on the ground, I was born of the Sacchi era, and that was tweaked with a bit of Pep’s system at Barca. I liked a 4-2-3-1 or a 4-1-3-2 with flying wingers and a deep lying playmaker like my best man Andrea Pirlo – oh what I’d give to have Andrea with me here I though.  Tim Sparv, captain and centre midfielder was my only real option, not quite Andrea Pirlo more Andrea Borcelli, but beggers can’t be choosers. And I couldn’t add a bastard to the team anyway. I sold 20 players from the first team and U21 level and bought in 8. I soon realised that attracting players to this pocket of the Netherlands was going to be harder than trying to get Richard Keys to talk to a woman without getting his cock out.

I bought Jan Vennegoor of Hesselink – on the condition he used his whole name on his shirt – we needed the cash, that’s for sure.  I also brought in a young Ivorian by the name of Wilfred, people said he was injury prone, but I knew class when I saw it and I liked his style -  quick and strong, he’d clean up in this Division. The day after I signed him, he was out for 6 months. The perfect forward partnership was over before it had begun, I was never able to play them both in my time at Groningen.

I bought the young Tomic, a flying winger from Partizan hoping he’d swing some croses in for Jan. First game of the season couldn’t have been harder, away at Ajax, but what a game it was. Sparv was proving me wrong, running the midfield in a 4-1-3-2. Jan was bullying the young Ajax side, hassling and getting on the end of most crosses. We went 1-0 up, Jan on his debut, no one wanted him, but I took a punt and he owed me that and I told him so at half time. Ajax then turned the screw and went 2-1 up. A test of my coaching badges, what would Arrigo do now?

I decided to continue as I was. I gave the team a passionate half time speech. Come on lads, where’s the passion? Sparv seemed to wake up again and he started to run the midfield again, that was Tim’s problem – inconsistency, in training he’d hit a couple of good freekicks and think he was the main man I remember challenging him to a crossbar competition with 50 balls on the edge of the area, he got 13, I got 50 – he never had the stomach for the fight, or the technique and I only had one knee. Maybe that wasn’t the best motivator actually…

Anyway, Sparv was actually pulling his finger out, we were running the show, and duly equalised, Jan again on the end of a Tomic cross, this was perfect. A point away at the Champions. This will do me nicely.

But then it got better.

Sparv, was over a freekick – “Leave it to Tomic! Leave it to Tomic!” I shouted, he’s the freekick taker. Tim didn’t listen, he took a short run up and smashed it – hitting the bar and in. 3-2  – we’d done it! Lucky bastard, but who cared! 3-2 against the champions!

The match ended and I felt like I was on top of the world. We’re going to do something special here I told the press, we’ll upset the apple cart – and the oranges too and you wait and see what we do to the lemon cart you lucky bastards.

Little did I know that would be the only points we’d pick up for 6 games, including an embarrassing 1-4 home loss to VVV. Jan, with his 3 year contract had decided he didn’t need to train as hard as he did in preseason and Sparv was still talking about that freekick. Bloody hell I thought – I’ve been stitched right up here.

We won 2 games in the next 5, both 1-0, both from Tomic freekicks, I’d taken Sparv off them after he started shooting from 45 yards out. He was doing my head in.

We were struggling in 14th for most of the year, RKC beat us 5-2 at home. Injuries were piling up. I tried changing the preparation but no dice. We just couldn’t score, Wilfred was still nursing an injury and hadn’t played a minute this season.

“I need more time – my main striker hasn’t played and the boys are still gelling. We beat Ajax – that’s the kind of thing I can do.”

“We’re 15th in the league and we’ve won 9 games in 40 in call comps. We just can’t do it anymore, Tim Sparv came to speak to us today and said he was sick and tired of being told what to do – you’ve lost the dressing room Roberto, and when that happens you know what they say? “

“Get a new one?”

“Afraid not, I’m sorry to bring you in on Christmas day, but it’s better this way.”

“Trust me – you’ll live to regret this, I’ve given you the foundation of a golden team here, a league winning side. Maybe not this year, but you watch. You’ll beg me to come back one day.”

“Merry Christmas Roberto, good luck and can you drop off the company car keys next week? We hear Ian Dowie is available so we’d like him to step in asap and he wants a car and wants to clean it of your failure he said, sorry but you know our business.”

“Whatever you say. You’ll see, you’ll all see!” I said pointing at everyone in the room – there was only one other person around, but it felt like the right thing to do.

I left the Netherlands and went back home to my London flat. Christmas was always tough, but being sacked made it even harder. I did some more commentating this time with SKY but I couldn’t get into it, I mean Scott Minto – what’s he ever bloody won!?

I was gagging for a new opportunity. Then I got a call.

“Hi, hi – is this Roberto?”

“Yes, yes it is.”

“We’d like to offer you a job”.

“Fantastic” – he sounded Dutch, I knew Feyenoord were looking for a manager – I knew my stock hadn’t dropped too low, YES! I’ll show those idiots at Groningen, and only 4 months later.

“I work for Westerlo, we’re in the Belgian second division, well, we will be, we’ve just been relegated. Roy Hodgson said you’d be perfect for us – we’re small.”

“Oh, Westerlo. Did he now, that’s kind of him, where did you finish last year?”

“Bottom, by 20 points”

“Only way is up I guess.”

Little did I know that this was the beginning of a real legend.

To be continued….

Money makes FIFA’s world go round

Posted: May 12, 2011 by onefootinthegame in England, FIFA, Sepp Blatter
Tags: , , , , , , ,
0
Sepp Blatter at signing of agreement creating ...

Image via Wikipedia

Money is swilling around football like never before and it seems its governing body FIFA is acting more like the Mafia then a benevolent organisation who believes in the principle of “fair play”.

In the UK there has been a long held suspicion that FIFA not only is envious of the power and success of the Premier League but also that the Teflon-coated Sepp Blatter is Il Capo of a seedy, corrupt footballing empire where his members are either too scared or too self interested to vote him out.

In the last few years there has been repeated evidence highlighting a level of corruption that permeates every layer of the organisation.

The revelations by Lord Treisman at a Parliamentary enquiry into our failure to secure the 2018 World Cup smack of more then just sour grapes. After all what possible benefit is it to him to name the perpetrators?

Triesman alleges  that four senior officials asked for bribes in return for their votes. Jack Warner asked for £2.5 million for a school (or as he put it “his legacy”) to be built in Trinidad that would also house his offices. Nicolas Leoz from Paraguay asked for a knighthood in return for his vote. Worawi Makudi the member for Thailand asked for the TV rights to a future international between England and Thailand to be given to him. Ricardo Teixeira the Brazilan representative wasn’t that fussy

“come and tell me what you have got for me”.

Warner, Leoz and Texeira all have previous in this area. The Panorama programme aired in 2010 showed Leoz and Texiera were part of a list of officials who had been paid almost S100 million over a 10 year period by marketing firm ISL to ensure they were awarded marketing contracts for successive World Cups. FIFA didn’t bother investigating as they say the information

“failed to come from official channels”.

Jack Warner is a particularly loathsome individual who was shown to have made $3million profit from selling world cup in 2006 via one of his travel companies. His own country’s players have had to take him to court to get what was owed to them following Trinidad & Tobago’s appearance in the 2006 World Cup.

Sepp Blatter, of course relies on Warner’s guaranteed 35 regional votes at each FIFA congress to get re-elected and is willing to a turn a blind eye to his indiscretions.

As soon as the draw for the next two World Cups was made last December I knew something fishy had gone on. Russia is known as a corruption hotspot and I have no doubt some of the oil millions have found their way into the greedy pockets of voting members. Now that the cat is well and truly out the bag I expect our industrious press will uncover some evidence. Unless they get a Polonium milkshake first.

What about the footballing giants of Qatar? They got the nod despite the fact that the World Cup inspection committee found they were the least suited to hosting a World Cup due to a lack of infrastructure, facilities and soaring summer temperatures. In the last few days The Times has published evidence that Issa Hayatou, of Cameroon, and Jacques Anouma, of Ivory Coast, received $1.5 million each in bribes from the Qatar 2022 bid in exchange for their votes. Thanks to these two, players will have to play in 120 degree heat. I suggest fans bring a hat.

So, to put this into context 8 out of 24 members of FIFA executive committee have either been accused of corruption or banned by FIFA for breaching their code of ethics. And those are only the ones we know about. If that isn’t evidence of an organisation riddled with corruption I don’t know what is.

Of course when confronted by the damning evidence Blatter, despite his vice-president lining his pockets for years, made out that butter wouldn’t melt in his mouth. Ever the expert politician he claimed he was going to investigate thoroughly blah blah blah and crack down on the abuses

“Zero tolerance is going through FIFA, it is one of the items on the Congress. It is my battle horse.”

Yeah Sepp, sure it is.

Related articles

International class

Posted: March 29, 2011 by onefootinthegame in England, International football, Scotland, World Cup 2010
Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , ,
3
Scotland versus Holland match at the 1996 Euro...

Image via Wikipedia

International class. It’s a phrase regularly bandied about by armchair pundits. It can be used to bemoan the merits of a particular player “Barry’s never been international class”, or critique the ability of upcoming opponents “Montenegro only have two international class players”. But what exactly does international class mean? Does it actually make sense?

The phrase is loaded with assumptions. First that the qualities needed for international football are fixed, clearly defined and permanent.

Are any of the Scotland team who took on Brazil at the weekend worthy of being mentioned in the same breath as Mackay, Dalglish or Jimmy Johnston? If Scotland cannot find heirs to these honoured sons should they refuse to play another fixture?

Clearly no, but implicit in the phrase is the suggestion that international teams should only be allowed to field players who meet this hazy, ill-defined criteria. I can’t think of an international team in history who’ve been so blessed. Look at any championship winning side and there’s a journeyman, or three, somewhere happy to be pegged to this coat tails of the sides genuinely great players.

Now I’m not pretending there aren’t better or worse players in every team. But if they’re pulling on the jersey for their country they have without question achieved the threshold of being international class.

So why does anyone use the phrase? For me it’s about trying to add a little gravitas to an opinion by invoking this unknown, undefined benchmark of quality. International class? It’s just a snobbish way you of saying you don’t think a player or team are good enough.

Come in Home Nations. Your Country needs you.

Posted: January 11, 2011 by onefootinthegame in England, Sepp Blatter
Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,
1

Last year was dire for English football. We performed ineptly at the World Cup and our bid to host the 2018 tournament was humiliatingly dismissed by FIFA.

Our domestic game was increasingly crowded with overseas players at clubs owned by foreign nationals. Owners who can’t wait to take their teams matches around the world.

I thought our national game was in trouble. In danger of being irreparably ruined. I’ll admit I was worried. Luckily the Football Association have acted decisively to stop the rot. They’ve brought back the British Home Championship.

Now I know what you’re thinking. Surely we should be sorting out the coaching system so our young players can cut it domestically let alone internationally.

Surely we should be putting in place new rules about the ownership of clubs so that the fans, and the local communities from which those clubs sprang, don’t play second fiddle to global marketing drives.

And yes, they’re probably the things that should happen. They’re eminently sensible ideas, but they would be a bit difficult to do. It might take some thinking, and it’d be one of things you have to keep diligently working on rather than let fizzle out quietly until everyone forgets about it.

But these foreign countries haven’t been playing fair for years. They keep producing these technically and tactically superior players and it’s got to the point where it’s just a lot simpler if we don’t play with them any more.

Make no mistake national pride is at stake. If they won’t let us run the World Cup we should just bloody show them how it’s done and run our own damn tournament. One we can definitely qualify for without too much trouble. In fact we’ll make qualification automatic. Just try and stop us Sepp Blatter.

So now the time has come. The time to close the borders and seal ourselves off from the rest of the global game. We need to be the North Korea of world football. Because the British Home Championship is the perfect solution for English football. It’ll give us the chance to be a big fish in a small pond. Admittedly a stagnant pond that the rest of the world doesn’t care about. It’s like what they say about drowning. It’s actually a delightful sensation after your stop struggling.

 

Now time for the real witch hunt

Posted: December 3, 2010 by onefootinthegame in World Cup 2018, world cup 2022
Tags: , , , , , , , , ,
1
The FIFA World Cup (awarded 1974–Present)

Image via Wikipedia

Yesterday’s announcement of the bids for the World Cups in 2018 and 2022 was gutting for everyone involved with football in Britain. Though England were bidding for the World Cup I can’t imagine there were many people in Wales, Scotland or Northern Ireland who didn’t want them to win so they could see the World Cup being played on their doorstep. The reasons why the World Cup should have come to the UK are myriad and have been talked about endlessly. Let’s be honest, as football fans you know we’d put on a great show and pack out the stadiums without having to resort to bussing people in.

Despite presenting what FIFA called an ‘excellent’ technical bid, England only managed to get 2 votes (one of them England’s). FIFA have since come out and stated that media intrusion and allegations against high ranking FIFA officials put them off. The Panorama programme broadcast on BBC One on Monday highlighted what many who follow football already knew, that FIFA is a corrupt organisation.  The repeated appearance of Concacaf president Jack Warner was no surprise to those who have paid any attention to the World Cup bidding process.

By hiding behind the fear of media scrutiny FIFA have occupied a cowardly position which shows that something is rotten in the state of football. How fitting that an organisation as crooked as FIFA have given the 2018 World Cup to what is basically a gangster state. The recent wikileaks cables from the US Embassy have estimated that over $300bn is siphoned out of the Russian economy every year in bribes. Corruption isn’t quite on the level of a failed African state, but it’s not far off. Add in the racism that greets most black footballers whether playing for home or visiting teams and you’ve got a recipe for a World Cup that could be fraught with problems.

If FIFA think they’ve been put under the spotlight already then I think it’s time to show them what a real UK media witch-hunt is like.

First things first, the bid team should release every detail of the bid process. Who spoke to who about what, who paid for what, publish all accounts and transactions, all correspondence whether public or private. The demands that FIFA were asking of the government, the new laws and tax exemptions that parliament would have been forced to pass. Throw it all out into the open. Make it public domain. If FIFA is clean they should have nothing to fear. But as I just pointed out, it is obvious that their conscience is not clear.

Then let the papers do what they do best. Forensic scrutiny of the minutiae the material looking to expose any semblance of wrongdoing or hypocrisy. Which sets off a seemingly endless cycle of 24 hour comment and analysis on TV, radio and websites. Stories about a story about a story about FIFA corruption. Hyperbole, allegation, speculation, rumour. Questions in parliament, pressure on the FA. Demands that ‘something is done’.

We’ve all seen the ridiculousness of what can happen when some MPs claim a few quid too much on their expenses, imagine what they could do with details of unelected officials taking hundreds of millions of dollars of bribes. The UK media still has a high reputation across the world, outlets such as The Times, The Guardian, The BBC can spread the campaign throughout football in Europe and then globally. If the Premier League decide to put their oar in then you can guarantee the world of football will sit up and listen given it’s money, power and reach. Create so much pressure that FIFA simply have to cave, or that some sort of body decides to formally investigate them.

Seriously, what do we have to lose? Most of the members of the FIFA executive committee will be dead or retired by the time we get a chance to bid again. Sunlight is the best disinfectant and by turning over the rotten log we may be able see the woodlice scurrying away and stop them. This isn’t sour grapes from the losers. Much as the World Cup would have been amazing if held in England, for many it would have been done with a peg on the nose to hide the stench of corruption. This is an opportunity to reform and improve the way that football is run globally.

P.S

As a postscript, I really do hope Israel qualify for the Qatar World Cup. Or that there are some openly gay footballers playing for national sides by 2022 (homosexuality is illegal in Qatar). Just to see how open and welcoming the Qataris really are

Related Articles

Danny Murphy: Whistle Blower?

Posted: October 8, 2010 by onefootinthegame in England, Premier League
Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , ,
0
Danny Murphy and Paul Konchesky of Fulham FC.

Image via Wikipedia

Danny Murphy threw himself into the debate on tackling in English football late, two footed, and playing the man.

In unusually candid comments for someone still playing the game, he pointed the finger at Messers Allardyce, Pulis and McCarthy, accusing them of sending out teams so “pumped up there are inevitably going to be problems”.

I’ve now heard a host of reasons why there’s been a horrible spate of broken legs. Players aren’t taught how to tackle; players don’t wear proper shin pads; it’s a contact sport; it’s part of our game, it’s a legitimate tactic, the only way inferior teams can compete.

Circling round the argument are a legion of ex-pros testifying that the game today isn’t as hard as when they played. But are we any closer to understanding what’s happening. What should we conclude?

Firstly, we should acknowledge that the rheumy eyed old hard men from years past have a point. The game is not as “hard” as it used to be. You only need to watch Match of the 70s to see how what constitutes an acceptable tackle has changed. If modern day refereeing standards were applied there wouldn’t have been a game in that decade that ended with 22 men on the field.

Outlawing the tackle from behind has also made a huge difference in promoting ball playing over ball winning. This has been reinforced by countless FIFA tweaks to the interpretations of the existing laws. But if tackling is now less rugged, why are we seeing worse injuries?

I turn back to another observation from watching Match of the 70s. Compare the spindly limbed physiques of those players to the build of the heavyweight hulks who ply their trade today.

Like many other sports, football has improved the diet, nutrition and fitness of its players. Players are more muscular, faster, and crucially heavier. Apparently the average weight of the Chelsea team is over 13 stone. With heavier players tackling at faster velocities it’s little wonder that there are more impact injuries and more broken bones.

The quality of the pitches for me is another likely culprit. Compare the quagmires that teams in the 70s played on to the lush, smooth, un-rutted pitches that are played on today. Yes, it’s dead easy to slide tackle on a muddy pitch, but you can’t do it at pace. It’s just impossible to run at your top speed on a boggy pitch with your boots caked in mud.

There’s an interesting parallel with rugby. The same improvements in sport science have led to bigger, stronger and bulkier players and corresponded with a similar rise in impact related injuries.

So if that is the reason what can be done. You can’t limit the size and weight of players. Tougher penalties for reckless fouls would fail because it’s impossible to prove intent. Murphy’s himself hints at what I think the solution is, that players use more “brains” when making challenges. It might be the solution, but I don’t see it happening any time soon.

Related Articles

Can England make a good football documentary by the next World Cup?

Posted: October 4, 2010 by onefootinthegame in England, Premier League, World Cup 2010, World Cup 2018
Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , ,
0

Like millions of football fans I tuned in full of hope. I felt this could be the programme that would finally put to rest all those years of hurt.

There were pundits who every weekend in the Premier League look like world beaters. And we had a presenter with a world class reputation and a world class salary.

But the England disease returned. Despite being made by one the world’s elite broadcasters we struggled to learn anything throughout and were comprehensively spanked by German pundits.

Something is very wrong. But can we find a cure and relive journalistic football glory again?

Can England make a good football documentary by the next World Cup? Indeed any World Cup?

We had a quick recap of what had gone wrong in South Africa.

An expensively assembled panel of former players had let their country down. This ‘golden generation’ of pundits though weren’t interested in researching the teams they were watching. Fans had to sit and watch whilst the pundits fell back on cliché, football orthodoxy and matey bonhomie. Techniques which by now were outdated in football coverage.

Some of the people interviewed even questioned if England had ever had any good pundits. They talked about the dark days of the past were people like Bob Wilson, Saint  Greavsie and Garth Crooks made a living from the game. In fact some of the still were.

Next we learnt that we don’t have the talent available to us at the highest level. Only 25% of the pundits working for the top broadcasters were English. Our football broadcasting having become bloated with ex-players and journalists from across Europe.

Trevor Brooking told us that our media coaching wasn’t producing pundits good enough for international broadcasting. This was because there were too many TV companies involved in running of football coverage.

Sir Trevor even apologised for his own role in providing non-committal, opinion free commentary on football matches. We knew he was sorry because he’d interrupted a hard day’s work at a private golf club in Surrey to talk to England‘s second best crisp salesman of all-time. [He could‘ve been number one but got too fancy with a routine sale of chip sticks to Brazil].

We were then told about Spain. Apparently 20 years ago things there had been even worse than in England. However, they’d decided to do something about it. They’d dedicated resources to developing the next generation of pundits with an emphasis on tactical fluency, penetrating insight and a comprehensive vocabulary.

Gary ended the programme by telling us he believed that maybe the poverty of our punditry had been so bad that TV bosses were finally going to do something about it.

Hopefully Gary hadn’t seen that MOTD2 was on afterwards with Lee Dixon, Alan Hansen and Clarence Seedorf. TV bosses, it seemed, hadn’t started doing anything just yet.

Sven the Fox?

Posted: October 1, 2010 by onefootinthegame in Championship
Tags: , , , , , , , , ,
4
Thumbs up for Sven?

Thumbs up for Sven?

There’s a knowing sneer to the reports that Sven-Goran Eriksson is in talks with Leicester City for the manager’s job. There here is again. Brazenly touting himself like a football management prostitute. How has Sven come to be regarded as a joke? Does he really deserve such contempt?

Sure his England reign imploded, mired in sex scandals and a disappointing exit from the World Cup. The recent sojourn at Notts County was just plain bizarre. But I can only think that it’s familiarity which has bred the unjustified contempt which predominates. His record certainly doesn’t merit this view.

Under Sven England qualified for tournaments with relative ease. A record which the likes of Graham Taylor and Steve McLaren would be pleased to have. Qualification was invariably followed by a quarter final appearance. Apart from Sir Alf Ramsey there isn’t a manager who can lay claim to a similar tournament record. Sure Robson reached the semi’s in Italia ‘90 but his copy book was blotted by failure’s at Euro’s 84 and 88.

Sven’s club record is also incomparable to any English manager working today. League titles in three different countries and European silverware to go alongside that. However, all that was achieved outside the UK and our insular attitudes seem to preclude acknowledging those achievements.

It looked as if he might be on the way to rehabilitating his reputation in this country at Manchester City after leading them to their highest finish in years. However, he found himself the victim of the whims of the club’s then chairman who curtailed his reign.

We also seem to have fatally misunderstood Eriksson’s management style. Derided for being in hock to celebrity of the players he was supposed to be in charge of. We’ve overlooked the method to Eriksson’s approach.

Players rule and managers no longer wield the omnipotent power of old. As an international manager you have even less authority over players. We saw in the South Africa what happened when Capello tried to assert draconian authority over his players.

Eriksson understood that the dynamics of the relationship between manager and player in the modern game. You might find it distasteful, but he wanted to get close to the players and befriend them. That was his plan and by and large it worked.

I can’t pretend Eriksson is a candidate for sainthood. He clearly likes a pound note. And he is a serial flirt when comes to the possibility of a new, better paid, job. But is it really fair to hold that against the man? Is he any worse than most players?

Sven has an exemplary track record. It can therefore be no surprise that his name is so frequently linked with jobs. The fact he’s regarded with sniggering derision in this country says more about our expectations of a football manager than it does about Eriksson’s abilities.

Is Fabio’s time up?

Posted: September 1, 2010 by onefootinthegame in England, Players, Premier League, World Cup 2010
Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , ,
1

Fabio Capello

Is Fabio Capello's reign as England manager about to come to an end?

After a disastrous World Cup campaign, the previously untouchable ‘Don’ Fabio is under siege like never before. The man who was hailed for bringing an iron discipline and purpose to post-McClaren England and oversaw a World Cup qualification campaign marked by a glut of goals and positive performances is now down in the trenches fighting for his very survival as England manager. Or is he?

Noises from the FA recently have been less than supportive of the beleaguered England manager. The back pages of the newspapers are currently full of talk of Capello being under pressure from FA suits to change his style and image and in particular to soften his stance with the players. The recent spate of high profile withdrawals from the squad for the upcoming Euro 2012 qualifiers with Bulgaria and Switzerland has raised fears that the Italian has lost the respect of the players.

The FA has done very little to dispel the speculation surrounding Capello’s future. Ironically, the very things that once made Capello the darling of the English football press and public, namely his iron discipline and strictness with the players, are now under assault, with many hacks simplistically blaming them for England’s poor performances in South Africa and seemingly non-existent morale and fight. One Italian onlooker remarked at the height of the John Terry mutiny that Capello is not used to winning people over to his methods, he’s used to winning.

Add to this Club England manager Adrian Bevington’s rather inappropriate statements last month that the next ‘England manager would be English’ and that ‘a lot of people have a very different view of Fabio Capello now to the one they had before the World Cup’, and it is hard to see the Italian being around to carry out the work he set out to do after taking over from the much derided Steve McClaren. Incidentally, McClaren’s stock is on the rise again after a successful spell in Holland with FC Twente. In the same statement, Bevington  said that it “is our (the FA’s) job is to support him (Capello) as best we can.” A job which the FA, and you in particular, are doing extremely badly, Adrian.

Capello’s reign as England manager could come to an end sooner rather the later, perhaps after a couple of bad results in the upcoming qualifiers. I doubt very much that, assuming the rumours are true, Capello appreciates being told how to do his job or address his squad, and I would not be at all surprised to see him leave. After all, Capello’s methods have brought him great success at almost every club he has been at. Why should he change them now?

Getting rid of Capello now, or forcing him into a position to leave, would be foolhardy. Capello certainly made mistakes in a desperate World Cup campaign for England in which he must take a share of the blame. Theo Walcott should have gone to the World Cup. Adam Johnson, too. Shaun Wright Phillips should not have been anywhere near South Africa, other than as a paying spectator.  A non match-fit Gareth Barry should have been left out for Michael Carrick. Gerrard should have played in his favoured central position behind Wayne Rooney, not out left, where he was still arguably England’s best player. Joe Hart should have played in goal in spite of his inexperience due to the error prone alternatives.  There is no doubt Capello made mistakes, but then it is easy to criticise with the benefit of hindsight.

Really though, the players need to take the majority of the criticism for their listless  displays in South Africa, particularly against an extremely limited Algeria side when victory would have likely provided a significantly easier route in the latter stages of the World Cup. Indeed, we might be discussing England’s semi-final heroes instead of second round chumps had we qualified as group winners, such is the fickle nature of International football.

Those praying for Capello’s demise I give you two words: Euro ‘88. Yes, Euro ‘88, the tournament remembered for Rinus Michel’s total football (version.2) and Marco Van Basten’s individual brilliance. England played three games in West Germany, losing all three. The manager? Bobby Robson, England’s most celebrated coach since Sir Alf Ramsey. You might remember two years down the line in Italy the late, great Robson led England to within a penalty shootout of the World Cup final. Now nobody is saying Capello will do the same or even better at Euro 2012. Nonetheless, Capello can learn from the mistakes of South Africa and lead England into a brighter future come Euro 2012 with the support of the FA and the fickle football public.