The sad an inevitable slide of English football into oblivion as a second rate team
I
watched the 1966 World Cup Final on television with my two sons, and while we
were jubilant with the result it was only what we had expected and anything
less than a convincing victory was never in our thoughts.
However,
since that day, I have sadly watched a succession of excellent young players
run themselves into the ground during the English team’s long and inevitable
slide into obscurity. The ignominy of failing to qualify for Euro-2008 is only
a few games away, and under the current coaching methods and management style
it is sadly predictable.
An era
of dark and empty days of watching future championships without an English side
will then follow. Furthermore, just like the countless decades since the tennis
world feared an Englishman, without draconian changes at the very top of the FA
and right down to coaching staff level, it will be a long time before
footballing-nations once again fear an English team.
In 1966,
we had some of the best players in the world with a highly respected manager
who knew exactly how to extract 120% from his team and would brook no
interference whatsoever.
I once
played football against Tommy Lawton and I even scored a goal, but this was in
the early days of WWII when most of the English team were under the protection
of the Army. I was only 3-years old and had Matt Busby of Scotland, who
was in the
Army Physical Training Corps, on my side! Playing for England used
to be a highly sought after honour, but today it is seen as a punishment by
players who mooch around the turf with attitudes that show only too well they
would much rather be elsewhere.
After
all, who wants to play football for a bunch of losers?
The
miserable, lack-lustre performance of most English players in all our recent
games is going to get worse, and even the occasional win cannot reverse the
trend. I know little more about football coaching and management than a
cabbage, but I’ll guarantee that left to myself I could select and coach a team
to perform better than any we have seen for many a year.
But
therein lies the problem, because I could not and would not be left to myself.
One wonders how successful Christopher Columbus, Genghis Kahn, or Napoleon
would have been with a management committee hassling their every move and a
manual to follow that was written by people who didn’t even know what problems
needed to be overcome never mind how to overcome them.
Great
football managers in the English football leagues produce great teams and
fantastic results because they manage without interference from their
superiors. Woe betides the director who tries to give the likes of Sir Alex
Ferguson instructions on how to manage his team! Since the formation of the English
Premier League, we have seen a succession of excellent managers fail to produce
good results—not because of their incompetence, but because of interference and
instructions from board level.
There is
no doubt that eventually heads will roll in English football. However, it will
be the heads of the hapless coach and his assistant—who have lost all sense of
direction and couldn’t make a right decision if they were told the answer—and
not those of the bloated superiors at the FA, who are safe and happy with their
sinecures. When a company returns a succession of bad results the shareholders
call for the resignation of directors and managers, after all, they own the
company.
Well, as
owners of the FA, we must now call for the resignation of everybody involved,
because we have suffered four decades of misery under their leadership, and I
for one don’t want there to be a fifth! It really does seem true that people
are promoted to a level of incompetence, where they are then left to spend the
rest of their days, comforted by the knowledge that they will never lose their
job.
Future
managers or coaches of English football team should be selected by the people
who know and love football—the annual season ticket holders at all our league
clubs. Any person who considers they have the qualifications and experience to
manage and coach the English team should be able to pay the fee and register
their name for ballot.
Then let
the supporters decide who is best for the job, because the FA sure as hell
cannot!
Article Source: http://www.theukarticledirectory.co.uk/.
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