h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

No. They're lumped together because of their management style. Mourinho's only 10 years younger than Dalglish.

Another factor to consider in the pipeline of "English managers" of top class- is the problems that have been around in producing English players of top class.

Surely names like Rooney, Gerrard, Neville point to the fact that these English players have non-English roots, probably amongst economic migrants into England.. It always used to be acknowledged that the great "breeding houses" of boxers and footballers were the deprived areas of places like the NE, Lancashire, the East End of London, and other parts like the Islington region where I taught briefly in the late 80's in "the worst school in the whole of the ILEA" according to The London Programme. It had, however, produced many professional footballers and- squeezed in between Arsenal and Tottenham, football was something of a religion amongst the pupils.

By the late eighties, however, very few boys really had the drive necessary to succeed and get up and out of where they were. Some of those with some talent in the school football team often said that they did not need either an education, or even a good school report- so the school "could not touch" them. They could be lazy,arrogant, disobedient and disrespectful with impunity, as if a football apprenticeship was not essentially very much like a pupil status.

The recent David Ginola story was a reminder of the sacrifices that have to be made. He could have been an Olympic and World Championship skier at the age of 15. But once he had signed up as a football apprentice he was banned from skiing for 20 years.

This reminded me of an ideal pupil from the early seventies who (perhaps excessively) made a point of personally thanking me for every lesson. When he was 16 he proudly started to come to school on a moped. Then I saw him without it. "Had to give it up, Sir. I have signed up with Fulham, and I am banned from things that could get me injured."

Arsene Wenger commented some time ago, when asked why he was signing up so many French players and not English ones, that he would love to sign more English ones- but generally they lacked the character and attitude required to succeed.

And perhaps one could also then add "to cope with success". Back in the days of boxers and footballers being forged in poverty, if they became footballers they just about earned a living wage. My older brother turned down an apprenticeship with Wolves c1958 in order to take up an apprenticeship with the RAF, a more secure future. When he was 18-19 Bristol City offered him a contract to just turn out to play for them in matches on Saturdays without any training, but he told them that it was the only time that he could see his girlfriend. No-one made a fortune playing football back then.

But the big-money age of football has proved lethal to many English players (and no doubt players from other backgrounds- e.g.Georgie Best).. So many of them who had nothing really in their lives except football were destroyed by a combination of idleness, too much free time, and too much temptation. Tony Adams, for example, managed to get through his own dark period, and I seem to remember even get into management. But it was always apparent (to me at least) that there was a bit more to Martin O'Neale, with perhaps his Irish background encouraging him to try to lay more solid foundations for his life. Like, I believe Ossie Ardiles, O'Neale used his free time as a young footballer to do a degree in law. I always felt that it showed in his work ethic as a player, and shows now in his management style as almost Brian Clough+education.

Cass

lol wut

swl

Well.. I believe that those family names are Celtish or Scottish, and that therefore these famiies will have been to some extent shaped by the very different history of Ireland and Scotland to that of England.

In England Queen Elizabeth I , back in the 1590's, approved a law that gave all poor people a right to the support of their local community in Hard Times. No such legal right ever existed in the other two realms, though people could receive licenses to beg on the streets or house to house.

As we still see on the streets of London, you are likely to get more money by providing entertainment than just by simple begging. And long before the age of professional sport, some poor men in Scotland who had sporting ability supplemented their earnings by taking part in sporting events that entertained those pretty well as poor as they were, but at least it passed the time.

So the writer Thomas Carlyle had a father and grandfather who were local bare fist-fighters, passing those skills down the family along with other essential life skills. And I well remember, as some prosperity began to emerge in the late Fifties and Sixties, that amateur athletes from England nearing the end of their career might eventually risk everything by participating in the professional street races in Scottish cities like Glasgow. Of course if they won and received any cash prize they were automatically debarred from all amateur sport.

I do not know whether such things happened in Ireland, but on the recent visit of Queen Elizabeth II to the Irish Republic there was coverage of the vital role of the Gaelic Sports association in Ireland over the last century or so of the Gaelic revival in organising all kinds of Gaelic games in order to promote all kinds of fitness- physical, mental moral, vitally important amidst the Hard Times that (as now once again) made so many young people emigrate for lack of Future prospects.

In contrast perhaps- by the Eighties school sports in English schools, perhaps the nearest thing to that, were gradually being phased out of most English schools not leasst because of the "Baker Hours" (named after Kenneth Baker) by which teachers who ran school teams for inter-school sports etc no longer had that time and effort recognised as part of the work that they were contracted to do. Inter-school games competitions within the State sector more or less died out - certainly in many parts of the country.

Cass

I notice the "line" from Klanfield and their cult like supporters* now seems to be that it was actually Evra who refused Suarez's hand. W.T.F.?!?!?!?!?!?!?

I mean honestly Livepool fans* are starting to resemble Creationists and other conspiracy theory nuts more and more.

Liverpool = Joke Club.

FB

* I know it is some fans and not all, I know a fair few who are thoroughly embarrassed by the hierarchy at Klanfield and a number of their more vocal public supporters.

Dalglish is digging a hole for himself.

"I didn't see it... that's contrary to what I was told."

What? The BBC made it up? Who told him differently?

http://www.liverpoolfc.tv/news/latest-news/luis-suarez-i-m-sorry

FB

I'm not convinced there's any kind of link between being a world class player and being a world class manager. Alex Ferguson, David Moyes, and Arsene Wenger didn't have particularly distinguished playing careers, and I think Wenger only played a handful of matches. I'm not even sure that Jose Mourinho played professionally at all. My own personal experience is that 'natural' sportsmen and women often don't make good coaches, because they've got much less experience at having to work at it.

I always thought that Neville was the family name of the Earls of Warwick, which I imagine would make it ultimately Norman in origin. Now you could make a case that that makes Phil and Gary of immigrant stock, of course, but it's a little tenuous.....

As the great Arrigo Saachi said, 'You don't have to have been a horse in order to be a jockey.'

I love that quote.

#129 "As the great Arrigo Saachi said, 'You don't have to have been a horse in order to be a jockey.'"

... but you might have to be an ass.

Otto

Thanks .. Now I look in my surname book- it says the Nevilles were the family of the Earls of Westmorland- not quite into Scotland.. As you say a Norman name- and the Norman rule exended right up to Edinburgh and across the Pale in Ireland.. But that is clutching at straws.. Perhaps I should go back to Emlyn Hughes.

Cass

Perhaps English managers stopped when it became more important to have continental connections and teh Premier League Trophy became available to the highest bidder exclusively.

It always was about the biggest support, but now its self perpetuating - if you finish top 4 then you'll get access to even more money, thus ensuring you're top 4 again, unless some mad sheikh/ogliarch/benefactor buys your club.

Mckay

There has also been the perception since that famous Hungary defeat that actually English football was out of date compared to Europe and Latin America.. In a way this was just a repeat of the first Industrial Revolution that was pioneered In England and then Great Britain, but which was taken up and made much more sophisticated, scientific and refined. Those of us who were taught football in the Fifties learned a system with a back two and a front five. Having watched some of the African Cup Final- no goals in full time and extra time- the game has come to react an emphasis on "realpolitik" and defence.. But, as Sisse has just commented, the English Premiereship is still expected to be about "end-to-end stuff" at 100 miles an hour with everyone giving 110%.

All huff and puff, and no blowing the house down.. But for some fans it seems it makes exciting watching.

And it tends to leave English teams outclassed when they play more intelligent international opposition, so financial backers import foreign players and foreign managers. Interestingly very often the foreign players are more articulate in English than the English players- and ex-player commentators.

In the light of today's news about Rangers I was tempted to revive the old Scottish Independence Yes or No thread. It was not many years ago that Celtic and Rangers were looking at trying to play in the English Premiereship because Scottish football and its crowd support etc could not support clubs of their stature.

Cass

Hmm - if Rangers are deducted 10 poionts they will be second and 9 points clear - that's not a league.

You have to go to Glasgow to appreciate the Celtic Rangers clubs - they are vast - Rangers supporters club is bigger that Coventry City's ground !

McKay

I am sure that you are right.. The whole Glasgow region and Clydeside seems to be something of an anomally in Scotland, probably for the similar reasons to Belfast in the island of Ireland.. Glasgow-Edinburgh.. Belfast-Dublin... The most powerful and committed bands of football supporters seem to spring from those huge Nineteenth Century industrial and commercial conurbations- with the most ardent local rivalries and local Derbies.

Cass

But perhaps those massive city realities often associated with slums,child labour and other forms of exploitation (by parents among others), etc goes to the heart of some of the issues about racism on this thread.

I well recall one day, when I was showing a class an episode of "How We Used to Live" featuring child labour in the textile mills, hearing two "West Indian" boys at the back saying to each other that they never realised that working people in the UK had had to work like that..

And in fact the great movement for real Factory Reform was triggered by an article by Richard Oastler entitled "Yorkshire Slavery" c1830, the starting point of which was Oastler touring some of the new-fangled mills that were creeping over the Pennines into the Yorkshire textle industry. He was with some West Indian 'planters', who were obviously aware of the great campaign in the UK against slavery. They expressed shock at seeing such young children being compelled to work in that way and asserted that they would not dare to treat their plantation slaves in that way. They would just rise up in rebellion.

This had happened c1822 and W.E. Gladstone's father, a great Liverpool merchant and West Indian plantation owner, and MP, had earned some public fame and acclaim in Liverpool by publically standing up for the strong action taken by the local authorities in the Caribbean in executing a number of the leaders of the uprising.

In fact I am just reading a biography of Winston Churchill that features the way that as a prospective Conservative MP in the 1890's he was naturally drawn to Oldham in Conservative Lancashire.. Those were the days when Lancashire could still believe that its economy could take on the world- certainly if there was a "level playing field" and other countries "played fair".

Cass

As I understand it Northern Ireland doesn't have its own football rivalries and has instead important the Rangers-Celtic stupidity. I know when I went on the Stranraer-Belfast ferry wearing a green and white striped jumper I was asked to take it off or cover it up.

HonestIago

Yes. Historically the Belfast-Clyde connection is very strong, not least because the short-crossing made it popular with Irish migrant farm workers who would cross over after planting their own plots and try to earn their money rent and passage home before they went back to harvest nb their potatoes.

Some Ulster Protestants who settled formed Clydeside "lodges" of the Orange Order, and (I seem to remember) that Orange Parades nb. for the Battle of the Boyne et have animated Celtic v Rangers animosities over the years..Hence the outcry about Paul Gascoigne's miming an Orange Piper on one occasion when he had scored against Celtic.

Cass

A man from round the corner from me was driven to beat up his wife because of Suarez's racist behaviour.

http://menmedia.co.uk/manchestereveningnews/news/s/1487279_judge-blasts-luis-suarez-after-handshake-bust-up-with-patrice-evra-prompts-manchester-united-fan-to-assault-wife-in-eccles

The mind boggles.