Ince demise highlights flawed thinking
Paul Ince's sacking once again exposes a major fault line in English football, the belief that a good player can instantly move into management and become a good manager. On the continent, they look at this English phenomena in wonderment.
Earlier this year, walking around Clairefontaine, the French Football Federation academy, I discussed the issue with Gerard Houllier. There was a lot of talk then of Alan Shearer becoming the Newcastle manager and thus emulating the likes of Bryan Robson, Gareth Southgate and Stuart Pearce, who had moved instantly into the top-flight of football management once their playing days were over.
"Would a manager of a big company put somebody without experience into a key position in his company? No, he would not, but they do it in football," Houllier told me, adding that managers needed to be "developed" and "prepared" for their roles.
The former Liverpool boss added: "I have never felt that England had this culture of developing coaches, but it is such a big country of football. Whether it is Bryan, Stuart or Gareth, I'm sure that they would have liked to go up the different steps and to have two or three years as an assistant manager."
Houllier also made the important point that in moving from player to manager a person needs to change. "As a player, you think of yourself and your career," he said. "The manager has the vision of the club to deal with and has got to think of a strategy."
Houllier may have a vested interest as he would clearly like to manage again in the Premier League, but his views are still worth considering. While Ince did acquire some experience of management at Maccesfield and MK Dons, it pales into insignificance compared to the steps the Frenchman had to climb on his way to the top.
Houllier is not the first continental coach to raise concerns about the management pathway in England. I recall years ago being told by Berti Vogts, then coach of Germany, that when he decided to go into management he had to go back to school first. I thought I had misheard him. "School?" I asked. Yes, he replied. In Germany, before you become a manager, you are put through a course of instruction which is in effect like going back to school, he explained.
Modern players in Britain may earn the required badges and pro-licence, but they are fast-tracked into management and often get their qualifications after they have got their jobs. This lack of preparation may explain why some of our great players have not made it in management.
Look down the list of some of our great post-war managers. The playing careers of Nicholson, Paisley, Wenger and Ferguson were hardly stellar class. Busby and Shankly were distinguished players while Clough might have been one had circumstances not denied him. Nevertheless, the latter will be remembered as a great manager not a great player.
Compare that with moderate or non-existent success of players like Robson (Bryan not Bobby), Souness, Hoddle, Hurst, Moore and Keane. Yes, Dalglish did the double with Liverpool, but in the end he found football management too much and even Liverpool fans remember him as a great player rather than a great manager.
Sir Alex Ferguson is well aware of the statistics and in a recent interview with GQ magazine discussed why Sir Bobby Charlton, perhaps the greatest of post-war English players, never made it as a manager. The interviewer pointed out that successful football managers had to be hard men who didn't take prisoners, not gentle, naturally retiring men like Charlton, who had not enjoyed a successful time as manager of Preston North End.
Here is what Ferguson said:
"No, you're right. I have spoken to Bobby many times on that subject. But he told me the one thing he found hardest was... he explained how he was doing this exercise with the players which involved switching the direction of play. They couldn't understand what he was talking about. To Charlton, who was such a beautiful, graceful player, it was a skill that came instinctively. But he discovered that his players not only couldn't do what he was asking, they couldn't even understand it. He told me it was at that moment that he decided this job was possibly not for him. So I don't believe that football management comes down simply to temperament. Things come naturally to a great player, he does not have to work it out. But a manager is forced to work things out because he is dealing with a squad of many talents and many temperments."
Three things have contributed to the modern tendency of players like Roy Keane to rush into management before they are ready.
First, compare Ince, or even more so Keane, with a truly great manager like Bill Shankly. Ince did gain managerial exposure with Macclesfield and MK Dons, but Shankly had to go through the grind of the lower leagues for a decade before coming to Liverpool, who, when he took over, were playing in the then second division. Yes, the two eras are very different. In those days, players did not earn millions. For Shankly, he would have earned more as a manager than a player. But players like Keane have made so much money before their career ends that the idea of learning the trade of management through the lower leagues for several years makes little sense.
There was not such a glare from the media spotlight in those days either. Or for that matter fan power. Both have clearly had an impact on the way football boards react.
Modern football does not provide directors with time to pause and carefully consider their options before making managerial appointments. Football directors may be successful men before they come into the sport, but, desperate to get success and fearful of what fans will say, they often opt for the easiest route. They hope that they can keep the supporters quiet and buy time by appointing a well-known player .More often than not, all they do is buy trouble for the future, as the situation at Blackburn shows.
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The basic fact of the matter is that Ince wasn't ready for a managerial job at Premiership level. This isn't a slight on his management abilities, he was just too inexperienced. Going from MK Dons to Blackburn Rovers is a huge jump and I'm not really surprised that he hasn't made it.
As I said just now, this dosen't mean he'll never make it at Premiership level as I think he will one day, but at this point in time he wasn't experienced enough to deal with the intense pressure and higher expectations that come with being manager of a Premiership club. Hope this dosen't put him off management for good because the english game needs more english managers not fewer.
It would be nice to see him bounce back with a championship club but he needs to stay with a club for a few years, then he'll get the experience he needs to be able to handle things better at the top level. Good luck Incey, I'm sure he'll be back in management soon.
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I can accept the oft-repeated and fairly self-evident viewpoint that great players don't always make great managers. But is this fast-tracking of famous names really an exclusively English phenomenon that foreigners look at "in wonderment"?
Frank Rijkaard became Barcelona coach when his only previous experience as a club manager was to get Sparta Rotterdam relegated from the Dutch top flight.
Jurgen Klinsmann went from sunning himself on a Californian beach, to Germany and then Bayern Munich manager, without serving any kind of apprenticeship.
Pep Guardiola is now Barcelona coach after one season's experience managing their B team.
Roberto Mancini walked into the Fiorentina job almost immediately after retiring as a player at Leicester.
Those are a few examples that spring to mind - please correct me if I'm mistaken with any of these. I'm sure I could think of more. With these in mind, can you defend the argument that this is something that only happens in England?
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Bertie Vogts is an abysmal manager...
Anyway, this assumes that managing the club is a purely pen-pushing, administrative endeavour. It is not, thus the company executive analogy is flawed.
Much of managing is dealing with different characters and liaising with experienced people, even if the person himself is not experienced. It is an alchemy that cannot always be quantified and empiricised. Those who believe coaching badges themselves indicate talent are duped by the bureaucratic disease that besets society. Coaching schemes may improve the overall standard but not necessarily of the individual.
Thus people with enthusiasm and intuitive communication skills can prosper, at least in the short term, while experience accrues. Furthermore, players often, though not exclusively, respond to someone who has already shown their credentials as a player.
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There are pro's and con's of not having the experience. Just look at Gareth Southgate who has had relative success whereas Paul Ince hasn't. I don't think its down to their experience as much, but whether or not they actually have what it takes to be a manager in the Premier League. Paul Ince I believe didn't.
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My view has always been that former players these days should perhaps look at the Director of Football role rather than manager for some of the reasons you touch on.
Their contacts book should be impressive, and they should have a good knowledge of players to look at - who better to gauge the quality of a player than a former top-class player?
It's a role which is not so much in the public glare either, which I believe is a major factor why many of these former players fail at management - they've earned so much money from playing that they simply don't need the constant media intrusions and find it either much easier to just walk away or too stressful and make mistakes in the job.
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Correct me if i am wrong but wasn't Pearce Kevin Keegan's assistant for the better part of three years prior to landing the Man City job?
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Re: Point 2.
Absolutely right. Van Basten is another example. Not a single shred of coaching experience before he got the Holland job, now he's manager of Ajax.
Johan Cruyff went straight from playing to managing Ajax (and didn't do too badly)
Beckenbauer is another example. So is Platini, who went straight to managing the French national team in the late 80s, in a similar manner to Beckenbauer and Van Basten.
So it isn't just a 'British' problem. However, I think men like Cruyff are clearly quite intelligent thinkers as well as great footballers, and their life is about the game. I don't get that impression of someone like Paul Ince, for example. Natural intelligence and an ability to relate to other people so that you can motivate them are clearly assets that a supremely successful manager needs.
Finding driven people with those qualities is becoming harder and harder. I think many people in management roles in ordinary walks of life don't know how to manage others. They turn to American business gurus and speak in jargon to cover their lack of ability.
They have their critics but men like Wenger and Mourinho are brilliant strategists, Ferguson is a wily old fox, Benitez has his blueprint for success. You look at Paul Ince and its like looking at a fitness instructor or your average PE teacher to be honest.
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This blog shows that reporters with an originally business background don't neccessarily make good Sports writers.
For a start you say compare players to managers like Ince and moreso Keane to Shankley. You then ignore Keane totally so why bother bringing him up.
Keane came to Sunderland when we were bottom of the Championship and he fully expected to be managing in the Championship for at least two seasons. So to say he went straight in at the highest level as you imply is simply wrong.
When you state that the list of managers you listed have had non-existant success is also not true. Just because they haven't won cups does not mean that they have not had success. After all it's a different world now, taking a team up and keeping them up is considered a success now and few of those you listed have been complete disasters, Robson was successful at Boro for a number of years before it went sour.
I also notice that you seem to laud the European way of producing managers as better than the UK's but I think you will find far more failed European managers in the PL history (only fair comparison) than you will ex-footballers.
Being a successful footballer is no guarantee of success but neither is it an automatic guarantee of failure.
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I knew it! we all knew it. Let this be lesson to those teams who think great players will be great managers. Zola is next.
http://idoitforfootball.wordpress.com/
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I already wrote this on 606 today.
It seems to me that the biggest problem is that a player doesn't need to be that intelligent. A manager requires to be much more intelligent. Quite simply put, many great players don't have the brains to be a great manager.
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Mancini, Klinsmann, Sousa, Deschamps, Blanc, Maradona, Le Guen.
All Non-English top players who have gone on to manage top teams with little or no experience. These are obviously not the whole lot, rather who I found after 5 minutes research on Wikipedia.
Once again a person in a powerful position in the media inventing a news story rather than actually researching a piece and writing it. You'll notice Mihir that 3 of the 7 are French.
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RE point 4.
You can't really compare Southgate and Ince.
Southgate had been with Boro as a player for several seasons before becoming manager. This meant he not only had very up to date knowledge of the PL, but more importantly of the inner workings of Boro and especially its players, who all looked up at him and respected him as a player. He had a rapport with the players, as well as konwing all their skills. Its whay Newcastle fans are so despearte for Shearer to come back, he knows the club and the players and is loved and respected there.
Ince by contrast as been out of PL for a number of years (not sure how many) and will have little knowledge of it other than what he got from seeing matches and what contacts he might have. He doesn't know the players at Blackburn and they dont know him (hence bringing in Fowler, to give him an ally in the dressing room). Blackburn's board knew he would need time to develop rapport with the players, understand their strengths and build up contacts in league. If they weren't prepared to give him the tiem to do this, why appoint him?
When clubs are appointing managers from outside the league (be they lower league or foreign) they have to be given time to build things up. The club appoints them because they believe them to be talented managers with something about them which will suit their club. This doesn't simply disappear, it just needs time to flourish. Look at Ramos- came with a great pedigree but no knowledge of the league and wasn't given time to turn it around. Clearly he can't be that bad or Real wouldn't have moved for him so quickly.
Sadly the pure greed that dominates our game means managers won't be given time to shine. When will clubs realise that managerial continuity breeds success? Look at Ferguson/Wenger/Benitez. They all get better with time.
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Re post 8
With the amount of money Keane had to spend at Sunderland he would have been a failure to not get them up. Any half decent manager could have done it with that much money. And he himself clearly thought he wasn't good enough, otherwise why would he quit? As far as I know, no-one was putting pressure on him to go, certainly not his board who begged him to stay
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nice article by Mihir Bose. Can't say i'm all that sorry for Ince - i remember him as a chippy little player and won't forget the cynical foul he committed on Scottish player McCann last they met in Euro qualifiers.
Small man - small mind.
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Sadly, another example, in a string of them, of why Mr Bose is not suited to commenting on football. Let's be honest, this is hardly a new phenomena, or, as others have commented on, restricted to the UK.
It's all too easy for people outside the English game to bash it, because we give them so much opportunity by kicking it ourselves - and have done since the miserable 80's.
But I digress..............
I have to ask, after some of the comments in the article, does Mr Bose subscribe to the Daily Mail view of football? This idea that only today is there an 'intense spotlight' on managers and players, that players only now earn mega bucks, that directors tend to knee jerk more often today than in the past. Nonsense.
As the excellent BBC programme on 'wage slaves' showed, football players since the start of the 20th C have always, relative to the times, earned huge sums, and not always at the top either. As for being in the spotlight, players were celebrities as early as the 1920's, never mind the hysteria of the 60's. A quick look at the old Rothman's, in particular at some clubs, shows just how many of them have fired managers with frightening regularity and shortness of tenure over their entire history! Pressure on chairmen to deliver, as all those sackings. stretching back in some cases to the 2nd World war proves, it was hardly any less in days of yore. It also reveals (starkly) that the current trend of 'great players' being 'dud' managers is hardly a new thing either.
Of the truly 'great players' of the past, only Don Revie and Joe Mercer can boast a good record in management, and again only after years of hard graft.
I have to say though, that Kenny Dalglish, much though I dislike him, can hardly, having achieved what only Clough had before him, that being he managed two different clubs to the title, be seen as 'not really making it'.
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Subterranean@7 : thanks, and you're right about the qualities that "thinking" footballers like Cruyff brought to the job, qualities which we are assuming (perhaps unfairly) that Ince did not have.
In fact, successful examples like Cruyff help illustrate the flip side of Mihir's argument. Great players may not always make great managers, but they are much more likely to do so than average players.
The reasons for this should be obvious. Top footballers will almost invariably have worked under top coaches for most of their career. Ince himself had played under Alex Ferguson, Terry Venables and Gerard Houllier (ok, some would dispute whether all of these are top coaches, but anyway ...)
If I had the opportunity to go to work with guys like these every day, observe their training methods, how they handle situations, and so on, then I would expect to learn a few things. Things that are difficult to learn playing for a third division side.
On the other hand, Jose Mourinho, with his distinctly average playing career, spent a decade serving an apprenticeship at top clubs in order to gain this same experience of watching the best (mostly Bobby Robson in his case) at work.
Obviously there are many other factors that make a good manager, as Mihir's Bobby Charlton example shows, but there is a certain logic in fast-tracking the top ex-professional players - if they have interpersonal skills and the ability to analyse the game. Whether Keane and Ince had those qualities is open to debate. But Gareth Southgate is still in a job, presumably because the skills he learned from other coaches during his playing career have helped him along the way.
(Still, I'll concede that he should probably have done his badges first.)
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The real flawed thinking is that because a young manager has been fired he has been unsuccessful, in comparison to Alex Ferguson or Shankly. Pretty much every manager is unsuccesful in comparison to those guys.
Only one manager per year can win the premiership, and since it has been just three teams contesting it for the past two decades, only five (I think) can be measured as successful in that respect.
Therefore its a fallible argument. Who knows if Paul Ince or Roy Keane would have been succesful if they had continued in their role? We dont even know if they would have been relegated its too early in the season to do more than speculate. The challenge for these guys is that when the going gets tough they dont have the background to count on support from the fans or the board. So much money is involved that the board will act quickly and try to get someone tried and trusted.
I think Blackburn will appoint a former premiership coach, like Allardyce or Curbishley.
Those guys dont create excitment in pre-season to help drive ticket sales, but once the season starts to head down they can probably save the day.
I should seperate kean from Ince, because Keane quit. I didnt see him as a quitter but there you go.
Dalglish quit on Liverpool, he had some reasons but I dont forgive him. And by the way he went on to win the premiership as Blackburn manager, so while Liverpool fans remember him more for his playing, its not fair to say he wasnt a good manager.
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Hi Mihir,
I see you work for the BBC. Just a question, what does the first "B" stand for, or should it be "E" in your case? Re-read your own blog, please and you'll see what I mean.
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Questioned, undermined, a climate of fear, created for a large part by the media, two wins and your back in the mix, Paul Ince, Black premiership manager, icon, role model needed help and support, confidence ebbed away helped on it's way by reporting, irresponsible journalism. It's done now and I hope all those responsible have learned their lesson for the sake of race relations and confidence and respect of those from the same background. Gareth Southgate is one of many who have survived, experienced managers have struggled and been relegated, in the premiership it is a struggle even if you're half way up the table at this moment, Paul Ince has been undermined and helped on his way, Stoke at home, a win and the bounce and belief come back, who knows ? But those in the media have a responsible part to play, who's head is next on the media platter ? A tragedy for Black youth and players.
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I don't see the point of coaching qualifications if you had a long playing career, since the qualifications seem to be experienced based, with a few seminars and an essay or two thrown in. There doesn't seem to be anything that a player cannot learn whilst he is playing, if he has the brains to look at what is going on around him. Southgate has done well at Middlesbrough with no 'experience' and no qualifications, but he clearly paid attention to what was happening around him. If you play for a significant amount of time you have 'done' the course, apart from the seminar and essay bit.
Going on a course will not make you spend wisely in the transfer market, if indeed your chairman would allow it anyway. Of course, on the continent the coach looks after the team and nothing else, whereas here they tend to do everything.
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10. It seems to me that the biggest problem is that a player doesn't need to be that intelligent. A manager requires to be much more intelligent. Quite simply put, many great players don't have the brains to be a great manager.
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Or in other words, it's got nothing to do with experience, training or coaching badges. Ince simply wasn't up to the job and never will be, any more than Brian Robson was.
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I think a good example of your point would be the appointment of Roy Hodgson at Fulham last year. A very experienced and well qualified coach, but perhaps not the "star quality" that Fulham fans were looking for. In retrospect, I doubt many of them would be upset given their survival last season.
Granted it doesn't always happen as i've decribed; a novice often gets an immediate reaction, but when the chips are down you can't beat a touch of experience.
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A lot of fair points, but your assessment of Dalglish is, I believe fundamentally wrong, flawed and actually disrespectful to the Hillsbrough tradgedy.
Kenny Dalglish did the double in his first season, and then in 87-88 Liverpool had their most dominant season of all time. One defeat (to Everton in the famous game 29) and remember in the title run in we destroyed second place Forest 5-0. It was only Hillsbrough that led to Dalglish's departure and not 'finding management too much'. To paint a parallel with other walk aways (e.g. Keane, Keegan) is an error of judgement and I would ask you retract this.
To add to this Kenny Dalglish went and won the title with Blackburn putting him alongside Brian Clough in performing this feate with two clubs.
Mark
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The only reason that clubs appoint famous names is as a marketing ploy. Club directors and chief execs are fairly stupid people who can't see beyond the end of next week.
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macatac, you can hardly compare Dalglish with Clough. I'm a Liverpool fan and an East Midlands lad and so I understand the merits of both, but Clough was in a league of his own. His feat wasn't winning titles with 2 clubs, it was doing so with two clubs which nobody ever expected to win.
What Clough did with Derby and Forrest would be like Hull winning the premier league today.
Even the greats such as Fergie and Wenger aren't quite in the same bracket as their achievements come with 'big' clubs with plenty of cash to spend. Dalgliesh doesnt come close.
Also I take a slight issue with Mihir's comment of Clough not being a great player. Does 251 goals in 274 games not count as great? Yes his career was cut short by injury but surely that sort of performance means he is a 'great' player, certainly considering how easily the term gets bandied around these days
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Unfortunate as it is, Blackburn have taken what they believe is the best decision for the club. I would make the same decision in the chairman's place. No disrespect to other clubs, but the Blackburn team certainly do not deserve to be where they are on the league table. And relegation, the board knows would be a disaster they can ill afford.
Ince simply wasn't ripe for it yet. The unfortunate thing was there was really no way to find out unless he was given a chance. He's had it and it hasn't worked out. Like my hero Roy Keane, I hope both men learn the right lessons from their respective experiences.
Personally I would love to see them back in management, at no higher then the Championship. There to learn the ropes thoroughly before moving to the top flight. Like someone said somewhere on this site, a top manager probably lasts up to 20 years. No need rushing to the top in 2, then.
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Re post 13
You want to check your fact's, Sunderland spent hardly anything when we were promoted. Keane went on to spend a lot of money in the Prem but don't mix that up with his first year.
Also I wish people would stop implying that race had anything to do with this, the Blackburn board took a huge risk appointing him because of his EXPERIENCE. As soon as it was obvious that the gamble had failed they needed to get rid of him end of story
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I think some of the generally accepted stuff is not that accurate about how humble some careers were. Also as a percentage being a top near top player compared to the vast population who tried football has a vastly bigger percentage chance of success. There are only 100s of top players at any one time but millions of poor players in the world.
Ferguson scored 25 in 41 for Rangers when Scotland was not a back water - he was then badly treated and left which maybe shaped him more than a supposedly humble playing record. He was top scorer for Dunfermline who came within 1 point of the Scottish League - 66 goals for them in 88 games is not bad in the league then.
Paisley lost 6 years to the war but was a division 1 winner as a player for Liverpool. Stein played for Celtic 148 times when again that was not shabby.
Arguably by numbers top players have more chance, by dint of better chances maybe, than non top players. Indeed take the list of great players in my lifetime Cruyff, Maradona, Pele, Beckenbauer, Platini I don't know run that list up to 10 even and you have at least 1 world cup and 1 European Cup and the head of UEFA. Think of any other criteria driven list of 1000 players/non players which narrows it down that much and has more than 1 winner? Zico works and w/could be included by some. Never mind if by some miracle Maradona wins something!
Cruyff and Beckenbauer indeed served no apprenticeship. I think what they show is that without the financial need they drop out of day to day management. This will be more of a problem. The other thing is that they were pretty intellectual about football.
In some ways what most of the English managers (ex player or not lack) is what Poyet pointed out about young English players they are not students of the game. That lack of intellectualism about football combined with maybe a tendency as recently retired and wanting to be one of the boys or worse over valuing players like themselves in some way (Roy Keane buying fringe Man United players - OK he was not fringe but like Bruce also initially went back to United for poor buys).
The other part is that injuries, maybe even the war, finances, bad luck and down right awful treatment left the likes of Clough, Ferguson, Shankly and others hungry for it. Whereas Dalglish who matched Clough winning the league with 2 clubs always found it easier to walk away.
I just hope that future managers don't need that Moyes/Ferguson/Wenger/ Mourinho/etc streak of bitterness, partiality and anger.
BTW What about picking players as managers who were surprisingly dropped from cup finals like Paisley and Ferguson (Dunfermline). Or blamed for a cup final loss like Ferguson and run out of town by Rangers?
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Big Sam Allardyce, Juan Ramos, Martin Jol, these were all seasoned coaches in the premiership that got the sack for the same reasons that the so called inexperienced coaches like Roy Keane and Paul Ince, walked and got sacked respectively. Roy and Paul, if you ask me have paid their dues. They played the game at the highest level, played under arguably one of the best club coach of all times, Sir Alex, both proved themselves at the lower leagues, how much more apprentice do you need. Modern football like most other fields in life is moving at a fast pace, improved technology, and ways of doing things generally affords a passionate learner a reasonable time to come to grasp with all there is to know about been a succesful coach. That explains the success of the likes of Rijkard, Deschamp, Van Basten, with relatively no experience after their playing days. The old ways of doing things have gone by, so if Berti Vogts, had to go back to school, perhaps it would have been more honourable for him to retire long before now, instead of showcasing his archaic tactics with Scotland and Nigeria. It is just a simple case of 'it didnt work out as planned" with Roy and Paul. They are both excellent coaches, just a matter of time, they will be vindicated.
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This is a really poor blog post.
As everyone above has posted, lack f experience has nothing to do with it. It is whether or not the guy is up to the job.
And it is very unfair to say Keane is a failure, in fact he has shown from his short time that he has the potential to be a great manager.
He was willing to work in the lower leagues but in some ways was a victim of his own success.
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Zola vs West Ham, another old boys act to get him there and put bums on seats, which will back fire spectacularly
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I'm surprised that no one has mentioned the obvious that a manager in any organisation must have leadership qualities, good judgement, people skills, motivational skill, be decisive and confident in their decisionsas well experience in the business, in this case football.
Some you're born with especially leadership, and others can be aquired with experience and training.
Players need to respect and believe in their manager, his team selections, tactics, and most importantly their individual roles. We're all born with body language reading skills, and unconciously recognise when someones voice says one thing and their facial expressions say another We instantly recognise weakness, indecision or flanneling. I think Steve Mclaren was a good (or bad!) example of this, and Paul Ince has has looked nervous and weak to me in interviews.
Next time any of any of the top managers are being interviewed, say Ferguson or Wenger, study them carefully and I think you may see what I mean.
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This really is a very poor blog.
There are so many points that are made by Mihir that make no sense.
- Dalglish "found management too much."
That's after doing the double with Liverpool then going on to win the Premiership with Blackburn, who incidentally happened to be the only team aside from Chelsea, Man U and Arsenal to win the title. I think many a manager would classify that as quite a successful spell.
- Roy Keane took Sunderland from the bottom of the Championship into the Premiership.... In ONE SEASON.
- As post 11 pointed out... Players moving straight into management is not something found only in Britain but across the continent.
- As post 25 pointed out Clough's 250 odd goals from less than 300 games would probably class him as a pretty good player.
- Many a manager with bucket loads of experience has not hacked it in the Premiership
- Pearce was in fact Keegan's assistant for nearly three years.
The list can go on and on.
There is nothing within this blog that actually provides us with any insight into why "Ince's demise highlights flawed thinking".
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who's GeraLd Houllier (2nd para)?
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It's marketing of a sort...fans DEMAND a big name who was a great player...you bring in someone like, say, Steve Wigley (the first example to come into my head, no doubt there's better ones - i'm not saying Wigley is/was a great manager). who's served a long apprenticeship either in the lower leagues or as an assistant, and the fans go "who" and immediately the manager faces an uphill battle. Someone like Hoddle, the fans can relate to his great playing career and he's got a head start in terms of fans confidence. It's short term thinking.
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Post 34... Thanks, got a good laugh from that.
Another reason why this article is something that really shouldn't have been published... on the BBC
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This comment was removed because the moderators found it broke the House Rules.
Oh dear, another Mihir Bose blog littered with errors, and erroneous conclusions not backed up by the facts. Just a few -
- It's Gerard Houllier. Walking around the academy with him, not to mention years at Liverpool, doesn't seem to have imprinted his name with Mr Bose.
- Dalglish won the double, and a Premiership with another team. Hardly a failure.
- Many examples of famous players in Europe being catapulted into management without experience. Cruyff, van Basten, Rijkaard, Deschamps, etc, etc
- Top players who became top managers - e.g. Ancelotti, Beckenbauer, etc
- Keane had two successful seasons
And so the list goes on. At the very least, I would expect the Sports Editor to check his own copy, and to have some evidence available to support his 'insights'.
As far as Ince is concerned, I think he was not ready for the top flight. Maybe he will be in the future, though as a player he was seldom thoughful or a great reader of the game. He also suffered from taking over from an excellent manager (Mark Hughes - no experience before being given the Wales job - d'oh!) who had over-achieved with the team/funds available.
There is no intrinsic reason why a good player cannot become a good manager. The key word there is "become". Look at the top five - Benitez, Scolari, Ferguson, Wenger, O'Neill. All built up their managerial careers over a significant time befire landing a plum job.
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Re: 26
It's rubbish that Blackburn don't 'deserve' to be in the nether regions of the Premiership table - the table doesn't lie, it doesn't matter who you are or what your pedigree is, the weakest teams flounder and unfortunately that's the case with Blackburn.
And I don't think Ince was given a chance. He was in charge of a team minus a couple of important players like Friedel, and if you look at their next three fixtures, these are all games they could have got points from to close that 5 point gap. They could at least have waited until the January window, unfortunately, money overrules everything nowadays and the spectre of relegation and the subsequent financial doom was loitering at the chairman's desk this 'early' in the season. I'm not saying Ince would have definately prospered and turned things around, in my eyes he may have come to the PL a season too early, but to sack him at this particular stage is ridiculous.
The only flawed thinking in football these days is that that surrounds the Sterling/Euro.
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I don't want to sound harsh, but I think that Mihir Bose is prone to producing uninteresting and poorly researched articles. I would expect better from the BBC's Sports Editor.
I appreciate that being in that position he feels obliged to write articles about football, but then Football is not really Mihir's game is it?
I think Paul Ince's appointment at Blackburn was a case of flawed thinking. He was proving himself to have a lot of potential and subsequently became over-hyped. You can understand why he was tempted to take the job, but it was a mistake on his part. The real error was the Board's for offering it to him in the first place.
I agree with many of the points raised so far so I won't repeat them. Only to say that while it is a risk to appoint a former top player so it is also a risk to appoint someone with no premiership experience. Very few good assistant coaches step up to be top managers.
Some good managers have been undone by flaws in their own character - Dalglish, Keegan, Hoddle, Venables and now Keane. It all goes to show that the answer is not simple, coupled with the fact that there is now no time to feel your way into a top job, you have to hit the ground running.
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Appointing Ince was a rediculously risky gamble. Ive never liked Ince myself, too much of a.. how can i put it.. Big time Charlie? Ok i might not be the first to say that, but anyway, i remember not too long ago he was saying there were issues of race within the Premier League due to the fact that there were no black managers at the time. Easily trying to fast track his way up in my opionion. By either way, Blackburn took a massive gamble in hiring Ince, because unless they were prepared to give him at LEAST one season, and take with it what may come, then what was the point. He wasnt going to get them near the top 4 after 6 months, it would take him that long just to learn all the players names.
Player to Managers like Southgate also intrigue me. Hes not going to win the league with boro, but so far he has done as good a job as anyone could expect, and that must purely be down to the fact that he has a football brain, and allready knew the ins and outs of the club he was managing.
Heres a bit of fun, everyone list a few players who you think could one day be great managers, and reasons for your choises.
Mine would be John terry - Very intellegent football brain, very authoritive character and a big presence.
Maybe even Michael owen... some might find that odd but he is someone who realy seems to know the game so well.
Ryan giggs - Surely must be one to look out for in a managerial role.
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rubbish... so many daft points and contradictions and schoolboy errors (Gerald) to even bother commenting...but i can't help it no matter how hard i try not to...
1. as already mentioned Van Basten and Klinnsman to name just 2 were given much bigger jobs than the mighty Blackburn role as their first job... but Mihir is obviously correct if you don't count Holland and Germany national sides as "big jobs" or maybe that they aren't on "the continent"
2. Ince had been a coach at Swindon and had 2 successful roles in management with MK Dons and Macclesfield before the Blackburn role... so he had a decent amount of experience
3. Great players don't make grat managers - Cruyff..??... maybe winning the European cup, cup winners cup, spanish league 4 times (Barca) and also the UEFA cup (Ajax) as a manger isn't a good record...or maybe Cruyff was just not a good player in Mihirs expert eyes... and his 1st job was Ajax... again maybe Mihir thinks this is a "small job" where he had chance to learn his trade.
4. Souness, Keegan, Dalgleish, Bobby Robson, Gullit, Hoddle, have all arguably been the most successful premier league managers other than Fergie, Wenger and Mourinho... (if you look at league finises and trophies won) i think you will find they were not bad players... but to describe their achievements as " moderate or non-existent success" is both hugely disrespectful and more importantly ignorant....
there are more things to say - but i can't be bothered...
Mihir - please stop writing such ill-informed articles...
and before anyone says "just don't read it".. i like readng about sport and i like reading mihirs blog...as it fills me with hope that i may also get a great job despite having no talent!
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personally I couldnt see Ryan Giggs in a management role, he seems to apssive a character. Gary Neville will almost certainly become a manager though.
Michael Owen is another that I dont think will become a manager, and if he does, not a successful 1.
John Terry probably will become a manager, but would he go anywhere other than chelsea???
Im quite suprised we havnt seen Sherringham try his hand at management yet as I thought he would be a natural.
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Agree completely with this blog.
It's been a gamble by the board that didn't pay off and I commend them for being bold enough to put a stop to it. At least now we may have time to secure Premiership status.
I also think that the back room staff warrant close scrutiny, particularly the defensive coaching. It's been pretty evident that last season's reasonably robust back line has been pulled apart somehow. We've managed to score quite a few goals this season (even 3 at Man U), but our defence is shocking. Certain people need to be taking a good long look at their ability to coach.
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And I thought that Mihir was a self-proclaimed Tottenham fan.
Bill Nick was a key player at Tottenham for many years including the Push & Run side that won the 1951 Championship. He played for England, albeit just the one game for various reasons, and scored after 19 seconds with his 1st touch. He may not have been Jurgen Klinsmann or Jimmy Greaves but he was certainly a top level, highly accomplished player, not somebody that you can put alongside Mourinho, Wenger, Houllier etc.
Bobby Robson was a top player. So was Scolari. But the point really is that few who have been successful have started coaching at the highest level immediately which is consistent with the argument made by Mr Bose rather than top players just don't make top managers. Bill Nick did. His first game in charge was against Everton which Spurs won 10-4 and in his second full season the club won the Double.
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Just a ridiculous article again. Dalgleish (as mentioned above by others) won the title at Blackburn after winning the double at Liverpool. Mihir?
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The problem with football, Mr Bose, is that for every winner there's a loser.
If all 20 Prem League Clubs were each managed by one of the 'best' 20 managers in the world, there would still be 6 or 7 clubs in the bottom 6 or 7 most of whom would finish the season with a change of manager.
That's football ........
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It was mystifying why Blackburn appointed Paul Ince in the first place. Why would anyone assume that two seasons in the fourth division would be appropriate preparation to take on a top division club?
Had Paul Ince stayed where he was, and continued to improve, he would probably be bang in line for the next decent job to come up at a Championship club, maybe at Charlton or at QPR before they made their recent appointment.
By getting MK Dons promoted from League Two (with an enormous playing budget for that division) he has done no more than Steve Tilson at Southend or Martin Ling at Orient and much less than Gary Johnson at Bristol City. But none of them played for Manchester United or Liverpool and had the weight of the media behind them when the Blackburn job became vacant in the first place.
Losing his job at Blackburn ought not to signal the end of his managerial career though, it just means he needs to go back lower down the ladder and start again.
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Players currently playing who would make good managers?
I think Xabi Alonso looks like management material in the Benitez mould, seems to be a 'student' of the game and have a keen understanding of it.
Steven Gerrard has been touted as a future Liverpool Manager, but I am unconvinced he has the tactical nous to be a manager.
Gary Neville will try to be a manager i'm sure.
Any others?
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It's funny how people pull out exceptions to prove the rule wrong. What about all other inexperienced managers that have failed at a high level?
Or maybe we should get rid of Wenger, Fergy, Scolari, O'Neill, Benitez, Moyes, Hodgson, Megson, Kinnear, Redknapp, etc... since experiece means nothing and noob managers is where it's at.
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A problem i can identify from the majority of responses on the blog, is which is the best path for a recently retired player to seek a career in management?
There are 2 options it seems, either start off in the lower leagues or join the coaching staff at a Premiership club.
However from my point of view there is only one option and that is to join the coaching staff at a top club. With the current gulf between the Premiership and League football what can anyone learn about life at top level football, coaching in a team that has no comparisons to top flight football.
For me it would be like comparing being the Manager of McDonalds to being the manager of The Ivy. These 2 jobs are the same in title but in application completely different - i'm 100% certain the responsibility & accountabliity of the McDonald's manager is less than 5% of that of a Top London Restaurants manager. However, it is not beyond a McDonald's manager to become the IVY manager it will just take a long and tedious path of promotions.
Also you have to look at for example someone like Steve Clarke. Here is a guy who had a good playing career but outside of Stamford Bridge not many people would remember much about his playing career. However, he has gone on to become one of the top coaches in the premiership. Many pundits believe that he was the chief string puller at chelsea and is now the tactical stalwart at West Ham. So why is it then, that whenever a top flight job in the premiership comes up, we never see him anywhere near the bookies favourites?
Am i the only one who thinks if Steve Clarke had applied for the Blackburn job (in the summer) he would not have even got an interview? So despite my views that a better apprenticeship would be served at a top prem club on the coaching staff, it seems that this path is also blocked unless you are 'big name' like Tony Adams.
Whilst the money reigme in the Prem still exists it will be harder and harder for any player to enter the premiership management circle unless, they use their current status instantly like Southgate did.
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Even by your standards, Mihir, this is a poorly thought out argument.
Many people have gone over the many inconsistencies and contradictions that struck me as exceptionally flawed so I won't go into detail on points have been made.
Nonetheless, a few other points yet to be made:
A typical Bose blog does love to name drop shamelessly, so it was no surprise to find that this article is essentially your thoughts after taking a stroll with Gerard Houllier at the French national academy, hamfistedly turned into a (poorly) thought piece on the state of modern management.
Since you were privy to Gerard's innermost thoughts, it might have been interesting to hear why he has not returned to the Premier League despite being linked with no less than 6 clubs in recent years (Sundelrand, Newcastle, Man City, West Brom, West Ham, Fulham):
http://www.sportwithoutspin.com/football081205houlliersunderland.htm
Instead, somewhat astonishingly you claim that "Houllier may have a vested interest as he would clearly like to manage again in the Premier League" and support this with no evidence but a link to an article about him ruling himself out of the Sunderland job, telling French TV "No, I'm not interested, and I haven't been contacted directly."
What?
Furthermore, you cite Houllier's claim that Whether it is Bryan, Stuart or Gareth, I'm sure that they would have liked to go up the different steps and to have two or three years as an assistant manager," implying this is a better ruote to success than going straight into management.
One poster above already noted that Pearce, who you highlight as an example of "flawed thinking", in fact served "two or three years as an assistant manager" to Kevin Keegan at Manchester City.
Steve McClaren served a 5 year apprenticeship under Jim Smith at Derby and Alex Ferguson at Manchester United and had mixed success at Middlesborough. He also served a 5 year international apprenticeship under Eriksson and was an unequivocal failure.
Of course, we can go back to Blackburn Rovers for another example of somebody who took the assistant manager route and failed miserably - Brian Kidd, following 7 years as assisting Ferguson at Manchester United.
Sammy Lee (took over after working under Sam Allardyce at Bolton) and Chris Hutchins (took over after working under Paul Jewell at Bradford then Wigan) are other recent failures have served lengthy apprenticeships.
This is not to say working as an assistant is not useful - Phil Brown worked under Allardyce at Bolton and has done a fantastic job at Hull - just that you cannot substantiate an argument that the failure of players going straight into management could be avoided by two or three years working as an assistant first.
It will be interesting to see how Tony Adams does at Portsmouth, having dived straight into the Wycombe job, failed miserably, then worked as an assistant for years before stepping up to the hot seat again in the Premier League.
As ever Mihir, I'll await a repsonse to my points and those of others that are well argued. as ever, I'm sure I'll be disappointed.
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Post #4: Gareth Southgate has had moderate "success" with Middlesborough? I assume by that you mean that he kept them in the Premier League?
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Bose I wish we would have a sensible youth system where coaches could prove themselves from a youn age. But it's not part of our culture, stupid though it maybe, partly because of the majority of the press in this country being at the level of the very worst sports journalists in the US. Maybe not you Mr Bose, but the vast majority of sports journalists couldn't cope with a Gross but love a bankrupter Venables or Redknapp.
Anyways it is not true your continent comment is it? Mancini virtually went straight into management. Donadoni did. And many other's from the great Milan teams have. Rijkard, Van Basten and others. So it's rather a lazy piece of journalism to suggest that. Unfotunately European football produces more cultured and intelligent players who are able to cope with the vicissitudes of managing twenty arrogant men.
I think a more pertinent questions is why do journalists repeating boring old truisms. How about a look at the next Roy Hodgson, or at least weave into the story a manager from leftfield? Maybe Nigel Adkins admittedly a leagu footballer, but one a long time ago. Adkins was a physio never having managed at league level. What does he have to say about proving yourself and getting the chance? I was mighty impressed with his Scunthorpe side, they lacked a bit of quality to unlock games but pressed and were compact like a Sacchi AC Milan 4-4-2. Then his best player was sold and still he competes at the top of the third tier. All your above boring clcihes is as enlightening as Gazza's drinks bills.
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I see the BBC think it's okay to "refer my post to the moderators" for six hours, without either blocking it or publishing it. All I did was to point out (politely) the various errors in Mr Bose's piece that everyone else has mentioned, as well as make a positive contribution about the subject matter itself.
It seems you can critique the words of Justin Webb, Robert Peston, Phil McNulty or anyone else who blogs for the BBC, but about one critique in four of Mr Bose will be pulled for no apparent reason.
Perhaps, since so many of Mr Bose's blogs seem to attract criticism of his arguments, evidence, or selection of story, the moderators would like to explain what kind of comments are not permitted and why. The "rules" of the blog are bland and catch-all nonsense - they don't help commenters to ensure they contribute something which will actually make it to the screen.
Since we all help to pay the wages of both the moderators and Mr Bose, perhaps we're entitled to a more detailed explanation than an unaccountable "refer to the rules". I'm sure I'm not the only one who is mystified as to how they might have been deemed to have broken the rules.
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no need to write about the examples raised in earlier comments that counter Mihir's argument. They seem pretty convincing to me... but on the blogging proceedure: it would be great to hear the writer's views on our views (otherwise it just seems like Mihir writes from a lofty perch with no interest in what any of us readers think). I thought blogs were meant for discussion?
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