An Impossible Job

He had just seen his team claw back a two goal deficit against Swansea and rescue an unlikely point ending a run of 5 straight defeats so you might think that the, then manager of Wolves, Mick McCarthy would have been happy when the Sky commentator shoved a microphone in his face at the end of the match. As it turned out, McCarthy was in no mood to exchange pleasantries.

He had made two late substitutions which had changed the game in his team's favour, but as he was doing so, his own fans were chanting "You don't know what you're doing" and "You're getting sacked in the morning". This, to a manager that kept a moderate team like Wolverhampton Wanderers in the Premier League for three consecutive seasons against all the odds.

Of course, Mick McCarthy is as thick skinned as only a Yorkshireman can be and has had to put up with far worse, such as a verbal volley from Roy Keane who, after a vile, foul mouthed tirade at McCarthy, spat out his dummy and walked away from the Republic of Ireland team at the 2002 World Cup because the training facilities weren't to his personal taste.

But the volley of abuse blasted at McCarthy during the Swansea match was simply further evidence of what managers are increasingly facing and have to work with. One can reasonably argue that they are paid much better than ever, but never before have they been subjected to such intense scrutiny from just about everybody from the press and TV media, to employers and their stakeholders.

Football in Britain has almost completely moved away from being a sport to a business. Moreover, it has become the ultimate results oriented business and the authors of the superbly written The 90 Minute Manager, Professors Chris Brady and David Bolchover, identified football management as the perfect role model for successful business management.

The basis of their argument is that football management is that rare example of where results are instantly exposed to all stakeholders. This is against a backdrop of having to deal with a myriad of difficulties that range from players personalities and egos (not to mention their agents) and often unrealistic expectations from Chairmen, the Board and the supporters, all in the full glare of the media spotlight.

There is no doubt that the pressure on managers is exacerbated by the vast sums of money circulating in football's obscenely inflated transfer market. Fans expectations have become ridiculously unrealistic and the increase in the number of foreign investors, many of whom have no understanding of the complexities of the game, has not helped.

We are now only a few weeks away from the start of the new English season and already managers will be starting to feel the pressure building. Fans expect, daily, to read about expensive, high profile additions to the playing staff and big name players at every club play the "club's ambition" card in their contract negotiations. Robin van Persie at Arsenal is the latest to do this, blaming his desire to leave the club on their "lack of ambition". This puts the onus for his departure squarely at the manager's door in the eyes of the fans who believe the club should throw money they haven't got around like confetti in order to build a team that will match their beloved Mr van Persie's expectations and therefore keep him at the club.

Should van Persie leave, and Arsenal fail to win a trophy for an 8th successive season, the pressure on the Arsenal board to sack Arsene Wenger, a manager who has produced 17 consecutive seasons of Champions League football, a feat matched only by Manchester United may become intolerable. He produced a Championship winning team that went an entire season undefeated (something that may never be equalled) and some argue that his sophisticated style of play has transformed English football radically. That will cut no ice with some fans, who think that simply having the name "Arsenal" gives them a divine right to winning cups and championships.

Wenger rode out the Fabregas "Will he go to Barcelona, won't he go to Barcelona" storm and so far the Arsenal board have been made of sterner stuff than to give in to the fans, but can that position be guaranteed if another barren season transpires..?

At least Arsenal sit at the top end of the league. At the other end, things can be even worse. One only had to sit and watch on TV, the awful, terrible spectacle of Blackburn Rovers fans turning their anger on manager Steve Kean in a match versus Bolton Wanderers before Christmas 2011. It was as disgraceful and sickening a public lynching as the human mind can imagine.

So, who in their right mind would want to be a football manager..? Most managers get paid far less than their top salaried players, and yet, it is their heads that invariably roll when the players decide they're not going to put the effort in for the man in the dugout anymore. The phrase "He's lost the dressing room" has become the players way of telling the Chairman "Sod results. We're only going through the motions until you sack him."

Perhaps some managers have a stubborn love of the game or an inner belief that they really can do the job successfully. Some must truly believe they can turn a struggling team's fortunes around and get a set of overpaid, preening, pampered prima donna multi-millionaires to behave like adults and professionals, and work honestly to achieve the results that their hyper-inflated wages suggest they should be capable of.

Some very experienced players who could have become managers have taken the easy option of going into TV punditry. Alan Hansen was offered the Liverpool job when Kenny Dalglish first quit Anfield in 1991. Instead, he took the "cumfy sofa" at the BBC and as a result, still has a full head of thick hair, something King Kenny conspicuously does not.

Andy Gray even interviewed for the job of manager at Everton before being recruited by Sky, where he'd still be today, on a seven figure salary if he hadn't committed professional suicide by being obscenely sexist to a female assistant referee directly into an open mic.

Punditry has offered many ex-players a lucrative and safe alternative to the pressures of management and who can blame them for taking the Sky shilling..?

Back in 1994, Channel Four screened a fly on the wall documentary that followed the hapless Graham Taylor's attempt to take England to the USA World Cup. His beleagured qualification campaign spawned the phrase "Do I not like that" and it summed up the title of the documentary: "An Impossible Job." At the time, it was believed that this applied only to the England manager's position, but 18 years later the same candid camera could be in any English football team dressing room and the story would no doubt draw the same conclusions.

Football management everywhere, has now become an impossible job.


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I think football management is evolving into a different kind of job these days, a very short term, jump from club to club kind of job. I think Mourinho has seen it, that managers won't be staying at clubs for years any more like Wenger and Ferguson, that if you can get the success, get as much as you can before moving on. Almost Roman-like, conquer, move on, conquer, move on.

It's why we've seen successful managers like Brendan Rodgers and Paul Lambert leave clubs they have built up and had success at for other jobs, because they know that while they are lauded as heroes now, in six months, if they are struggling, the fans and chairmen can quickly turn. So they move on, and try and recreate that success, if they fail, they move on again. Look at Roy Hodgson, success at Fulham, move to Liverpool, struggle move to West Brom, success, move to England.

I think the main difference is money, because chairmen and fans spend so much money, they expect instant results. It's very easy to make the manager the scapegoat, and so their jobs become get as much success as they can in a shortest space of time and then move on.

Crimey wrote:I think football management is evolving into a different kind of job these days, a very short term, jump from club to club kind of job. I think Mourinho has seen it, that managers won't be staying at clubs for years any more like Wenger and Ferguson, that if you can get the success, get as much as you can before moving on. Almost Roman-like, conquer, move on, conquer, move on.

It's why we've seen successful managers like Brendan Rodgers and Paul Lambert leave clubs they have built up and had success at for other jobs, because they know that while they are lauded as heroes now, in six months, if they are struggling, the fans and chairmen can quickly turn. So they move on, and try and recreate that success, if they fail, they move on again. Look at Roy Hodgson, success at Fulham, move to Liverpool, struggle move to West Brom, success, move to England.

I think the main difference is money, because chairmen and fans spend so much money, they expect instant results. It's very easy to make the manager the scapegoat, and so their jobs become get as much success as they can in a shortest space of time and then move on.

I think you're quite right, Crimey. The culture of the transient manager is evolving quite quickly. This is fine for the individual because by club hopping, gaining short term success and then moving on before they have a chance to fail they can acquire a reputation which is never put to any serious challenge. If Brendan Rogers or Paul Lambert are happy to have that sort of career in perpetuity, then there is no reason why they can't achieve a stress-free working life, make a tidy living and retire from it all one day with their heads held high.

But will they feel fulfilled..? Will this make them happy..?

I've looked into the careers of men like Ron Greenwood and Billy Nicholson... Bill Shankly and Bobby Robson. These were men who forged clubs that they became synonymous with and whose memory is revered. Robson did it twice..!! At Ipswich Town, then he took on the England job and suffered for a while, but found redemption at Italia '90. He wandered Europe for a while but eventually came home and did it again at his home town club, Newcastle United. I think he died a happy man.

I think that, in their private moments, sitting alone in the boot room at Anfield, or looking out across the deserted pitch at White Hart Lane on a Monday morning, they might have felt a quiet glow of pride in what they'd achieved. It was something I detected in the way Alan Curbishley always talked when he was at Charlton and was amongst the fans. He was in his milieu. As a player at a near derelict club, relocated to Croydon and being run out of portakabins, he saw the depths Charlton sunk to. At his managerial peak he must have looked across the club's rebuilt, swish, home at The Valley........looked at his team riding high in the top half of the Premiership and thought to himself "I did this".

Do you think Brendan Rogers and Paul Lambert, as transient "Guns For Hire" would ever experience that feeling..?

Perhaps Sir Alex Ferguson and Arsene Wenger are two of a dying breed. They come in for their fair share of criticism, most of it entirely justified, but there is no doubting their commitment to their clubs. A significant part of their success has been in the continuity they have brought. It hasn't guaranteed trophies.... hey, even Manchester United and Arsenal finished last season with only the Community Shield between them to show for their efforts..... but they'll be amongst the front runners again next season. The hard-as-nails Scot and the deep-thinking Frenchman aren't done yet.

Perhaps something is dying in the game. If the breed of nomadic managers, coming in, doing a job and then moving on becomes the norm, who will build the Great Clubs of the future..? What will become of Arsenal and Manchester United when Ferguson and Wenger are gone..?

A short-termist "Agency Manager" system will have knock on effects at grass roots, too. Who will nurture the youngsters..? Why should Brendan Rogers give a damn about Liverpool's academy..? By all the logic of his transient position, his job is to get results for the first team so he can negotiate the best contract he can get elsewhere for himself in a couple of years time. He is unlikely to be interested in producing young players who will flourish for somebody else in five years time. He will see his remit as putting a trophy on the sideboard at some point in his two or three year tenure. A Premiership title or an FA Cup looks as good on his CV as it does in the trophy room.

And so the game moves on. The money sloshes round and all sorts of interests dip their sticky fingers into the pot. Only the fans are truly committed to their clubs but as much as they love their own little corner of the football world, they (and the demanding Chairmen) don't see the damage their demands for immediate success and vilification of those who don't meet their requirements do to the game as a whole.

The very nature of football club management is changing and not for the better in my opinion. Perhaps the genuinely best managers will be found at the lower levels, working quietly, like Dario Grady did for thirty years at Crewe. Those who are away from the pressurised atmosphere of the top flight can metaphorically take time to smell the roses. They may not win too many trophies but some of them might be able to build something worthwhile, in an undemanding environment, that they can look back on at the end of the day with pride. A club which, say, produces a young player who goes on to be a great success that his mentor in the early years can later follow as any proud father does a successful son. A club that the fans will be truly sorry to see him retire from and their thanks will be heartfelt and genuine.

Perhaps it may not be such an impossible job after all. Just as long as you stay away from the top level of the game.


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I think it is a very interesting topic. As a fan of a lower league team, Bury FC I would say we have had the king of the nomadic managers, Neil Warnock. He was the king of the lower league football managers who in his later years began to get success at the higher levels.

When Neil came into Bury he was brought in to bring stability to the club, however he then brought in a lot of his 'own' players that he had at other clubs, such as Chris Billy, Adrian Littlejohn and Paul Williams. This didnt breed stability and we were eventually relegated, however he was still able to move onto Sheffield United and gain success.

I think this is what managers will be doing, like Brendan Rodgers is currently trying to purchase Joe Allen from his old club, managers will bring players in that have done the business for them before knowing they can trust their performance.

I agree that this may then have issues with the long term development of young players as unless they are an exceptional talent they wont get a look in over the players that are being brought in and the existing 'established' players.

Perhaps something is dying in the game. If the breed of nomadic managers, coming in, doing a job and then moving on becomes the norm, who will build the Great Clubs of the future..?

I think we're already seeing this, it's money and rich chairmen. In the past ten to twenty years, in England, the only two teams to go from midtable obscurity to huge clubs are Manchester City and Chelsea. We haven't seen a club built up to become a super power club since Manchester United under Ferguson really.

As much as I hate to use it as an example, but on Football Manager, perhaps it is just me but these things rarely are, but I spend time making the youth players better, even though I know I'll have either left the club or just stopped playing by the time it comes around. Rodgers won't be thinking in his head right now, that he's going to move on when he can, he'll be thinking as if he is going to stay there forever, and so will nurture the youth. I think all managers do it. I imagine Mancini is still nurturing the youth at City despite the fact that in all likelihood it will take just one trophyless season for him to get the sack.

Interesting comments, Crimey, and again, you make good, valid points.

I broadly agree your comment but I emphasise again that this is an evolutionary, not a revolutionary process. It is a silent, creeping process taking place over a period of time.

You cite Roberto Mancini. I think that, in a way, he is a bit like my dad. My old dad, when he retired from playing cricket, became an umpire. He stood in the County Leagues for a number of years. He said he did it because he wanted to give something back to the game. It had given him a lifetime of pleasure and he felt he owed it something.

It may be that Roberto Mancini and other former players currently in management think in that way too. They had their time as players and want to nurture something now, as managers, because that was the culture in which they were brought up. Again, the influences of men like Shankly, Nicholson, et al may have something to do with engendering that desire.

But we now live in an age of the self-obsessed footballer, who constantly has Mr Ten Percent whispering in his ear about how best to extract the next big money deal (from which he, the Agent, will also profit handsomely).

How many players of the Premiership Generation are going to end their playing careers thinking that they owe something to the game...? How many will have the desire to give something back..? I can think of Ryan Giggs and perhaps Paul Scholes, as dedicated "one club men" who may have inherited a deep and meaningful love for Manchester United, but how many others are there around, coming towards the end of their playing careers, who may put the good of the game ahead of their own selfish needs..?

Indeed, one may argue further that Giggs and Scholes may be highly motivated to work for Man Utd, but would not be able to replicate that devotion elsewhere, so their raison d'etre is not the love of the game, but love of their club, which is not the same thing.

The game is on a slippery slope to completely losing it's soul. It's already sold out to Mammon, but there are still enough good people around that care about it to keep it recognisable....... for now.

When those people who played in the Pre-Premiership, Pre-Champions League era, who are now the managers of this current day, retire and their love of the game for the game's sake goes with them, what will be left..?



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To be fair, most managers weren't the best players, and I imagine that will continue in the future. The egotistical players who are in football for the money are the players least likely to become managers, it is the players who just enjoy football who would probably join management, and I imagine they're the kind of players who would give something back.

Although I doubt know that many of the players personally, I can think of quite a lot of fairly big name players who I can imagine going into management and being devoted at it.

Giggs, Scholes, Xavi, Carragher, Danny Murphy, Brad Friedel, David James, Rio Ferdinand, even perhaps John Terry. I'm sure there are lots of others as well.

Hopefully Giggs,Scholes & Ferdinand don't go into TV punditry anyway!!!!

I've heard Giggs at it at he provided ZERO insight into the game and was dull to boot......in fact it's often said that some of the best players don't have a great knowledge/insight of the game...........i remember reading the John Giles Autobiography and he recalls that Sir Stanley Matthews was noted as having no real insight/knowledge of the game, yet what a great player he was................

The thing with management is that because of the financial impacts of where teams finish in the league now is now influencing the way that boardrooms view the managerial structure and don't trust just one person alone to deal with the issues on the pitch and some of the issues off the pitch. There seems to be a difference in a Manager handling team affairs and Coaches doing the same thing. Also most managers these days have Directors of Football to contend with. Boardrooms are now dictating how much players are valued. Either by wages or by the crazy price tags they put on players. It is very rare nowadays to see manager's given total control to mould team and the culture not just on the pitch but also off it too. Look at Ferguson with United. The last of his breed that has his influence and philosophy in-printed on to the club. Look at Liverpool. For years with Shankly and Paisley. The culture Liverpool back then more or less set the standards for what teams can achieve on and off the pitch. Loads of fans wanted to watch them play. They kept the foundations of which the team and club produced. Shankly passed down to Paisley, Paisley in turn passed down to Fagan and then down to Dalglish, Souness and Evans.

Liverpool were a club of great tradition and because of the drought of success that followed in the sudden domination by Manchester Utd that they broke away from their tradition and turned to foreign coaches and directors of football.

They have shown a return to form with the appointment of Rodgers which I hope generates the success they desire.

Managers nowaday have little time to imprint their philosophies and priniples on the club. See it will be interesting to see which direction Man Utd take after Ferguson leaves.

Arsenal are the team which most will strive to be like. Financially sensible and they have manager who now runs his club as a sustainable model in the wake of debt that has saddled most teams in the country. It is quite the reversal because it is clear the Arsenal boardroom wants outlaty investment on borrowed debt and yet it is Wenger chooses not to spend. He doesn't trust the board with the investment they want to put up front which is quite refreshing.

I hope to see a return to the days that saw Managers help shape clubs into a successful communial success.

A very thoughtful piece, Legend. Well said.

Yes, it is the devoted manager who cares for his club and puts its long term well being above short term success which is the most beneficial to the game overall.

The conundrum is: Which one will prevail..?

The game really IS on a slippery slope and it would be important if this concept were grasped..... and grasped quickly.

It's good to read a piece that offers optimism that there are still good men in the game who care. I hope their influence spreads and becomes a model to be followed, rather than being interpreted as a romantic notion that has no place in the 'real world of hardball management' as some might put it.

If ever another Bill Shankly was needed, it's now.


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