Let England Shake....

I have stolen the title from PJ Harvey’s 2011 Mercury Prize winning album, if I could write songs like her I wouldn’t have to worry about the mess English football is in, but I can’t so I have to worry! More about Polly Jean later.

Only in England can we lose a coach who in his last game beat the reigning World and European Champions and see our odds slashed to win the European Championship this summer. Only in England can we lose the coach with highest winning percentage in our National team’s history and see this as good news.

Fabio Capello is one of his generation’s finest minds and it’s worth reminding ourselves of his achievements

7 Serie A title with three different clubs, Milan, Juventus and Roma

2 La Liga titles with Madrid

Champions League with Milan

3 Suppercoppa’s in Italy

So, not to labour the point, 9 league titles, with 4 different teams, in 2 countries, and European Footballs Holy Grail with Milan in 1994: 4-0 in the final against a team from Spain by the way. His spell at Milan in the early 90’s is unmatched and the team he produced during that time would be in anyone’s top 5 and the English FA lose him 4 months from the start of a major tournament

I am sure there are many reasons why he left the job and we can speculate all we like but as the cliché goes, ‘at the end of the day’ Capello had had enough. The “Cult of Personality” that has developed around the England team since the arrival of the so called golden generation speaks to a wider issue in the country itself.

A country that is struggling to find its identity in the world and at war with itself: The 21 miles from Dover to the mainland of Europe may as well be a million miles as England is not in Europe, culturally, financially or philosophically. The country still carries the scars of a war fought and won almost 70 years ago and that greatest generation would turn in their graves at the sad state of the country that they knew. England’s green and pleasant lands have been replaced by concrete jungles that are no go areas after dark; the England that I grew up in has gone for good.

Now back to the football…..

How do you replace Capello? The England team has long revolved around he players and the belief that the best players can just roll up and beat old Johnny Foreigner. The rest of the world figured out long ago that the game is a team game and England’s group of individuals have consistently failed at the international level, Linekar, Shearer, Gascoigne, Beckham, Gerrard, Lampard, Terry, Rooney, Cole were no match for Johnny Foreigner.  England’s superstar players showed the world what they were in South Africa in 2010, yet less that two year later Capello had started to make changes. The win against Spain, after being outplayed for large portions of the game, was a cause for optimism and for the first time in a long time there was a sense of England being more a team that a collection of pouty professionals. Capello declared that England couldn’t beat Spain at their own game and he was right. The problem for England is that they have been trying to beat everyone at their own game since 1966!

So where do England go now. The people’s choice Harry Redknapp, currently at Tottenham, well he’s won the FA Cup once but he’s English so he is in the frame. He also spent last week in court, a place that the former captain and role model John Terry will be seeing soon, interestingly enough Steven Gerrard who may take the armband from Terry knows what the inside of a court room looks like.  One wonders why a number of the current England team along with a good number of ex England players want Redknapp, the return of passion in the England team has everyone waiting with baited breath. Unfortunately the Passion they talk of is not a technically gifted midfielder that England desperately  needs, its that up and at em, backs to the wall, glorious failure, knees up mother brown bullsh*t  that you get tired of very quickly.

The Football Association of England overlooked Brian Clough, blacklisted Don Revie and didn’t do enough to keep Terry Venables. Harry Redknapp has done a great job at Tottenham but he isn’t in the same class as Clough, Venables or Revie, that’s how England has fallen.

Whoever inherits the poisoned chalice will have more than enough on his plate. He will take over a group of players with average technical ability and world class egos. He will have to deal with a press pack that is poorly educated with regard the game outside of the Premier League, and with one or two notable exceptions poorly educated in the finer points of the game. 

There is, however, a possible silver lining. The ‘golden generation’ should be all but finished by the end of the summer and a clean sweep is on the cards. If the new manager can dispense with the old guard and bring in players that are able to adapt to different tactical strategies then England will remain what they are: a decent team with a good qualification record and a good bet to get to the last eight of a major tournament, but you wouldn’t want to play them because sometimes that passion thing takes over.

So who should the FA choose. Of their last 5 appointments, Hoddle, Keegan, Eriksson, McLaren and Capello, only Eriksson and Capello have left the team better off than they found them. Hoddle, Keegan and McLaren were all disasters and their careers have never recovered, so why the clamour for an English coach? If I had to make the choice I would look to Marcelo Bielsa. He is doing a great job with Athletico Bilbao and had success at the international level with both Argentina and Chile. He knows how to deal with the press and his three hour press conferences should be enough to keep the English press busy. He introduced younger players into the Chilean team which is exactly what would be needed with England. He seems to me to be a great fit for England but there is just one problem…he isn’t English!

As promised a little more about Polly Jean Harvey. In musical terms she is more like Capello than Redknapp having won the Mercury Music Prize twice in 2001 and 2011. She won’t manage England but she has is qualified to, she was born in Dorset!

The Summer of 82

It’s been a sad week in the Latham household following the news of the unfortunate death of the great Socrates earlier this week. When I say the Latham household, I really mean Jake, our dog, and myself as I have been telling him this week on our walks about the greatest team I ever saw-Brazil’s 1982 World Cup team.

My first love is Sheffield Wednesday, I didn’t pick them: they picked me. My grandfathers were ‘Wednesday’ and so was my father so I became ‘Wednesday’. Those of you who follow real English football will be pleased to hear that I haven’t subjected my son Oliver to being ‘Wednesday’ I just couldn’t do it to him. They are my love supreme, but many times I have tried to leave them but as the Godfather puts it, “every time I think I am out they find a way to suck me in”. They are doing it right know as they are flirting with the top of League 1, it probably won’t last, but….

Anyway back to the summer of 82. Prior to this particular World Cup the high points of my football life were: a mammoth tussle between the love supreme and some kick and run mob called Arsenal in the 3^rd round of the FA Cup, when it was the best cup competition in the world. We took them to FOUR replays before they knocked us out.  They had Liam Brady, we had Brian Hornsby! An unbelievable night at Blackburn in 1980 when Ian Mellor brought 9,000 grown men and boys to tears, eyes filling now as I write this, with a diving header that set us on the road back to the promised land, and a historic 4-0 humping of our dearly beloved neighbours, Sheffield United, on Boxing Day 1979. Not a lot to show for 14 years.

That summer I was looking forward to the World Cup, every football man has a World Cup and this was going to be mine. It started slowly with Belgium beating Argentina and Italy boring the pants off the world but later that night my whole life changed. I didn’t see the full game as back in 1982 there were only 4 TV channels in the UK, but in the highlight reel of the Brazil Russia game, I saw two goals that set my world on fire. It wasn’t just the goals it was the pure joy and emotion of the event that took my breath away.  Socrates stepping around Russian’s and firing into the net was magnificent but Eder’s winner was a thing of beauty: Falcao lets the ball run through his legs, Eder flicks in up and volleys past the keeper whose body language tells it all. Do yourself a favour and get on you tube as word don’t do it justice. I was hooked and in love and I couldn’t wait for more. Scotland and New Zealand were brushed aside and Brazil was in the quarter finals. The team were magicians and beautiful to watch and the name still role of the tongue, Falcao, Leandro, Junior, Eder, some chap called Zico, Oscar, the great Socrates and the most un-Brazilian of players the striker Serginho, who may have struggled to get into the Sheffield Wednesday team!

They were drawn in a group with Italy, who had just woken up and the reigning world champions Argentina. Brazil destroyed Argentina and July 5^th I skipped out from a work experience placement to watch Brazil play Italy in the deciding game for a place in the semi finals. Italy needed a win and Brazil only a draw, but someone forgot to tell Brazil. In undoubtedly the World Cup’s greatest game Paolo Rossi was reborn and Italy beat Brazil 3-2 and broke my heart. In Brazil this game is still referred to as the “Sarrias Disaster”. Bill Shankly once said that football was more important than life and death, well its not, but I have no words for how I felt on that Monday night. 

Italy went through to face Poland and the other semi final pitted West Germany against France, a team that England had beaten in the opening round of the tournament. The Germany France game from 1982 is on par with the Brazil France game of 1986, if you saw it you remember exactly where you where during the game. Germany won on penalties and went on to face Italy who was rejuvenated by the goal scoring form of Paolo Rossi. Italy triumphed 3-1 and my lasting memory of the final was the pure ecstasy and tears of Marco Tardelli after he scored Italy’s second goal.

The 1982 World Cup was over, but I can still remember everything about my grandmother’s front room on the night I saw the Brazil Russia highlights, and I can remember the short cut I took to get home in time to see the Brazil Italy game and I remember exactly what I did after I saw Tardelli’s celebration which has its own entry on Wikipedia

In closing…

I was disappointed to see Colin Miller leave the Whitecaps, another Canadian coach out of the league. I hope it won’t be long before we see Colin back in the game at the highest level.

And finally, the last Lower Island Soccer Coaches meeting of 2011 takes place on Monday 12^th December at the Lakehill Soccer Associations Braefoot Turf field from 6pm to 7.30pm, our topic for the night is “Defending in 2v2 and 3v3 situations”. I hope to see as many of you there as possible and remember to bring your boots!

A cause for concern

As promised I have some results from my initial observations of some U9 6v6 soccer. I have shared some of the info with a few colleagues to get their input and on the whole they have been as surprised as I was at the findings.

To recap, I had been watching some games in this age group and I had some concerns over the general lack of movement and ball contacts for the average player. Anyone who has watched games at this age will have seen the familiar pattern of two or three strong players on each team playing against each other with a supporting cast who are involved to a lesser extent.

So far the sample that I have is still relatively small but the results are somewhat surprising. With the help of Stu Hackett I have analysed 5 games and 10 different teams which included 89 players. The games we watched took place on the same day and on the same field so we have some constants, field size, game time and playing conditions. The previous analysis I had was on different days and different fields and some of the formats were mixed so I decided to drop these numbers from my analysis.

As I previously mentioned I decided to divide a players total number of ball touches by the total number of minutes in the game for a couple of reasons; first of all I don’t have enough help yet to monitor the actual playing time of each player and secondly, the vast majority of 8 year olds don’t play soccer away from the organisation we provide and they certainly don’t play when they are off the field during a game: so what they get with us is basically all they get, but more of that later.

So to the numbers:

In the games that we analysed only 28 players averaged more that 1 touch of the ball per minute. The highest number of touches a player achieved during the day was 91, which equates to 1.82 touches per minute for the most active player! Now, back to the way we got our TPM number. This particular player played on a team that had 8 players active in the game. So, 6 players were always on the field and two of them were on the bench, so on this team its pretty safe to suggest that the most active player was on the field approximately 75% of the time, and it’s absolutely certain that he received more that 50% of the time available.

To keep the ‘sabremetricians’ happy even if we adjust the TPM number and be generous and double it, the most active player had less than 4 touches per minute during the game!

When I first saw this number I was shocked as I was expecting to see that the dominant players were all over the ball and I expected to see a smaller number of players getting very little exposure to the ball. Unfortunately that small group is much larger that I had expected.

We found that 26 players averaged less than .5 touches on the ball over the course of the game and that the remaining 35 players averaged between a .5 to .99 touches per minute on the ball during the game. So in conclusion 69% of the players that took part the games that we watched had less than 1 touch of the ball per minute.  

As coaches we are always looking for the late developer and we always tell the story of Michael Jordan being cut from his junior high basketball team as an example of what you can achieve if you stick with it. Well, if Jordan lived in Victoria and he played soccer he would most likely be in the group of players who are getting less that 1 TPM. How long would he stay with the game before he looked for another sport?

If our late developers are getting less that 1 touch a minute then how are they going to develop? No wonder that they are late developers!  I have always thought that we lose a whole group of potential national team players every year, before we even know they exist and now I am convinced of that. We put a lot of faith in small sided games and see them as a great development tool, less players on the field gives them more chance to see the ball, well maybe not!

However way you look at this the actual ball contact in the game is not sufficient to allow the players to develop their skills. I believe that every time they touch the ball there is the chance for a ‘teaching moment’, either correction or praise. The more teaching moments we can provide the better. If they aren’t getting the touches in the games then our practices are critical to the development of this next generation on Canadian soccer players. Another reason for mandating coach certification!

So what now?

When I set out to do this study, I wanted to see what was going on the small sided game. Along with the touches per minute we were able to find some other statistics that interested us. The number of touches in the games we watched ranged from 637 to 732 with 4 of the 5 games within 54 touches. The number of touches per team ranged from 280 to 425 with 6 teams within 63 touches.

Our next step is to look at some more games to see if our numbers hold up. This will also allow us to find the optimum number of touches in a game. Once we find that number we will investigate ways of increasing the active players TPM number by reducing the number of players on the field and increasing the amount of active time in the game. We will also take this opportunity to look at the amount of physical activity that players undertake during the game and see if there is a link between TPM and physical activity.

If this is something that you are interested in and want a few more figures, then drop me a line headcoach@lowerislandsoccer.com and I will email you a short summary.

In closing, the next Lower Island Soccer Coaches Association meeting will take place next Friday, the 18^th of November at Reynolds Park on Prestwood Drive from 6.15pm. Our topic will be ‘Defending in 1v1 and 2v2 situations’. I hope to see as many of you there as possible and remember to bring your boots!

Defining success in youth sports

Well, we have taken a few shots this past couple of weeks from some poorly informed journalists criticising the LTPD plan and suggesting that we don’t want the players to be competitive and that we wont keep scores etc….I am not going to waste my time or yours by raking the coals. This dialogue does open up a good debate, in my opinion, regarding how we measure success in youth sports. Keeping scores and league tables at the younger ages is no predictor of how a team or a group of players will fare in future. We have all seen the dominant U10 team, bigger and faster than everyone else slowly fall from grace as the rest of the players catch up in size and speed and their superior technique which they worked on instead of shelling the ball down the, field takes over.

So how do we know if we are having success with our younger teams? Before I go any further let me be clear on one thing; I think winning is important…but so is losing. Youth sport is so much more than the outcome of any game. Sport teaches life lessons that are invaluable to us as we mature. We learn how to win and much more importantly, we learn how to lose and how to deal with disappointment. No one gets everything they want all the time and learning to deal with a loss is maybe the greatest life lesson there is:  the harsh truth in life is that the vast majority of us have a few more losses than wins!

I have always believed that the goal of the coach of a U6 team is to get the players to come back the following year, and in turn the goal of the U7 coach is to get them to come back as U8 players and so on. Athletes aren’t developed over one year; it’s a long term project, with the emphasis being on the long term.

If we want to try to define success in youth sports we need to look at much more than results and performance.

Our short term goals and ones that we can aim for in every session are pretty straight forward.

Make it enjoyable and keep them active.

Get them engaged in the process and make them feel a part of their team, not yours.

Teach them a new move

If they leave your session with a smile on their face then the chances are you are succeeding with the players and there is a greater chance of them coming back for more. Our game doesn’t have a problem attracting new players but we do have issues when it comes to player retention.

Defining long term success is a little wider in its scope incorporating the short term measures and some ‘bigger picture’ elements.

Teach them fair play and a respect for their opponents, the rules of the game and the officials who enforce the rules

Encourage them to always give their best effort, let them know that their best is always good enough regardless of the result

Make sure that the players are given opportunities to take on leadership roles within the team

From a technical point of view as coaches these elements will lead to success for your players:

Create an environment that allows and encourages the players to make their own decisions on the field

 Expose them to the different roles and responsibilities of different positions on the field

 Keep them challenged and keep them learning, in my experience we lose players because they stop improving-they aren’t burned out, they are bored

 Make the training competitive, the competition will stimulate their development.

Success in youth sports is difficult to measure and so is identifying the future top class athletes, one thing is for sure; when young players leave our game then we don’t get a second chance. I have always believed that we lose a team full of top class athletes in both genders each year before they ever get the soccer bug. If this is the case then the key measureable for defining success in youth soccer has to be retention: are our players coming back and are they playing as adults and staying active for life which is a key element of Long Term Player Development.

In closing…in my next blog I will give you more information on the touches per minute (TPM) project that I started in October. I have had some interesting conversations with Gregor Young from Monday Morning Centreback and we are talking about some projects that we can take on to get some more information on the small sided games.

The next Lower Island Soccer Coaches Association meeting will take place on Friday 18^th November at Reynolds Park starting at 6.15pm. The topic for the session will be basic defending in 1v1 and 2v2 situations. I hope to see as many of you there as possible and remember to bring your boots

A numbers game....

Earlier this year I decided that I was going to take a look at soccer in the U8 to U10 age groups to see what was actually going on during the game. I decided that I would look at the number of touches each player had in the game because my instinct tells me that the format does not provide enough contact on the ball for the ‘average’ player. My bigger concern is that if they don’t get enough action around the ball then in time they become disengaged with the game and lose interest. You can always see the players who have lost interest; they are the ones who are not moving! If they aren’t moving then they are not getting enough physical activity and that tax credit you get for putting your kids into organised sport in order to keep them active is really only working for your taxes and not your child.

Back to the issue at hand: If you have watched any games in this age group you will know that every game is a little different. Some kids have to leave at half time to go to a party; some don’t get there until the second half because they had a party earlier in the day. Some games are 5-a side, some games are 6 a side, some players may even play a half for each team because they other team is short and it’s not uncommon for one team to play with 5 and the other team to play with 6, but who cares. At the end of the day its mini soccer and it’s not possible to get continuity between teams.

This does pose a problem though for someone who is looking for a consistent statistic across a number of different formats. After a great deal of thought I came to the conclusion that the only statistic that I should look for was the number of touches the players had divided by the number of minutes that the game was played over, therefore my new number is ‘touches per minute’ or TPM’s. Just what we need another acronym!

For the purposes of my research I will use the length of the entire game for each player, rather than the individual number of minutes played per player. My rationale here is that I am looking at the format of the game, game length and team sizes to see what effect they have on the TPM’s for the players.

I am more interested in the experience of the child during the full time frame of the game on that day than the format of the game.

So, after watching 4 teams play what have I found out. Well 4 teams is not enough for me to come out with a cast iron conclusion but what I can say is that the TPM number for the strongest players is considerably lower than I thought it would be. I plan on watching another 16 teams and after I have some number from approximately 20 teams I will get back to you with some results.

In the meantime my question is this. What is an adequate number of touches per minute in a game and more importantly what number should we be aiming for in our training sessions? Just before I moved to Canada in 2001, I attended an in-service training day with the other youth coaches at Sheffield United. I remember that one of the conversations that day was regarding touches on the ball and how many a player should have during a session. The manager of Fulham at the time, Jean Tigana, had been quoted as suggesting that young players should be having around 2000 to 2500 touches on the ball per day! This was a second hand quote and I have never found a source but this number has always stuck with me and from time to time I will ask someone to keep track of a players touches during one of my sessions. In a 90 minute session a target of 1000 touches is a good target to aim for and I have got close once or twice

The more I think about this, touches on the ball is the only way our players will improve and the more touches they get the better. Every time our players touch the ball there is an opportunity for them to excel, if their technique is incorrect it’s a teaching opportunity for the coach.

We can’t manipulate the big game to increase the TPM but we can tailor our training sessions to increase our player’s touches on the ball. Tigana’s target is high and possibly unrealistic in our environment, so what is a good TPM rate for a practice?

Over the next couple of months I will be looking at TPM’s in a number of different practices and I would also be interested in your opinions on this. If you have any thoughts to share contact me by email at headcoach@lowerislandsoccer.com

In closing, thanks to everyone who attended our last coaches meeting on September 29 and thanks again to the Lakehill Soccer Association for allowing us to use their fields

We have two Community Coach Youth Courses coming up in the Lower Island district, on October 22^nd and 23^rd Lakehill will be hosting a course and on November 6^th and 13^th the Juan De Fuca club will be hosting a course. Registration is on line via the BCSA website www.bcsoccer.net

Who replaces the irreplaceable?

In my last blog I asked the question, who will Manchester United look to replace Sir Alex Ferguson when he finally leaves the position on first team manager? In this blog I will give you some suggestions and my best bet.

If we take the examples of Leeds, Nottingham Forest, Liverpool and United themselves, we can see two trends: promote from within or look to an ex-player. Only Leeds United initially bucked the trend by appointing a high profile ‘outsider’ in Brian Clough. History tells us this was a huge failure as less that 7 weeks later Clough was out the door with a big pay off. Looking at the success Clough had later at Forest it could be argued that he was the right man but it was the wrong time, and as we all know everything in life is timing. After Clough Leeds turned to Jimmy Armfield another ‘outsider’ who kept them competitive and in the top ten, but when you have been at the top, then the top 10 isn’t good enough. Ask any Arsenal fan about that. Ultimately Leeds were falling off their perch and when they turned to a succession of ex players it was all over for them.

So, where does that leave Manchester United? In a tight spot if you ask me.

If they choose to follow the route of promoting from within, they currently have two choices. But before I look at those choices its worth taking a look at the careers of two of SAF’s previous assistants once they left United.

Brian Kidd, a Busby babe, was Alex Ferguson’s right hand man from 1991 to 1998 and at the time he was seen as a natural successor to SAF. Unfortunately, for Kidd, he left United to take charge of Blackburn in December of 98 and the following spring Rovers were relegated and before the December of that year he was out. Kidd has returned to being an assistant manager and now occupies a spot on the bench at Manchester City.

Steve McClaren was Ferguson’s assistant from 1999 to 2001. He left United to become the most successful manager in Middlesbrough’s history, but one good season in Holland and a number of disasters with England and Wolfsburg in Germany have blotted his copy book.  

Now the current insiders:

Mike Phelan, also an ex-player, in the assistant manager and Rene Meulensteen is the first team coach. Phelan is an interesting option as he would draw comparisons to Bob Paisley, Shankley's immediate successor at Anfield. Quiet and unassuming and as with Paisley an ex-player who didn’t fulfil his potential at the club. Phelan may stay with the club after Ferguson departs but I don’t see him as an option as a successor. A quiet unassuming ex player may have been able to step into the bright lights in 1974, but I don’t see Phelan being able to withstand the spotlight of managing Manchester United

Rene Meulensteen on the other hand may be a different story. In his second spell at the club Meulensteen is responsible for the high level of technical excellence we see from United every time they step on the field. Highly respected in the game, Ferguson has hired him twice, Meulensteen may be the man United are looking for. However, as with Phelan, the question remains will he be able to handle the pressure of being the top man at United.

When it comes to ex-players it’s hard to see the heir to the throne. When soccer players retired in the 60’s and 70’s and into the later 80’s they became coaches or bought a pub. Now they generally criticise others on TV or disappear into the sunset with a very large bank balance. Paul Ince, Brian Robson, Mark Hughes and Steve Bruce have and still are doing the rounds in England and you really don’t see any of them as the next Manchester United manager.

So if you are the Glazer’s and you are looking for the next boss of United experience tells you that you probably should look to an outsider to take on one of the biggest jobs in the game. At the moment in world football, there are 3 clubs that stand apart from the rest.  Barcelona, Real Madrid and Manchester United in terms of current squads, brand power and fan base have separated themselves from the rest. One or two in-different seasons can change that and a year out of the Champion’s League can trigger a meltdown as we saw with Leeds United around 10 years ago. If United make the wrong choice and they slip then their neighbours Manchester City are in prime position to become England’s club champions and that will hurt.

For me there is only one person that United should be looking at to take over when Sir Alex Ferguson finally calls it a day. The ‘special one’ Jose Mourinho is the natural successor. A friend of Sir Alex, Mourinho may be the only person on the planet who thinks he can go in to the club and do a better job! He will command the respect of the players as he is a player’s manager and a master of taking the focus away from the team in order to protect his players. He will immediately endear himself to the fan base when he declares this job as the biggest and best job in the world, putting United on a pedestal above his former employers, Madrid, Barca and Chelsea.

As I mentioned before, the key to life is timing and if the timing is right I expect to see the phrase ‘Manchester United manager Jose Mourinho’ in the not too distant future.

In closing, the next Lower Island Soccer Coaches Association meeting will take place at the Lakehill Soccer Associations Braefoot fields on Friday 30^th September at 6.00pm.  The topic of our session will be ‘Using conditioned small sided games’.

There may be trouble ahead... Manchester United's big, BIG problem

Well Manchester United and Sir Alex Ferguson have done it again! Right in front of our eyes SAF has built another great team and we never saw it coming. Now they can rightfully challenge the Catalan machine for the title of world’s greatest team. Maybe or maybe not, the season is still only a few weeks old and a lot can change in a season. One thing that won’t change this year but will become a bigger issue as this season draws on is this: what will life be like for United after Fergie? United look as dominant as ever but very soon they will have to look for a successor to the throne and history tells us that finding an heir to the throne makes beating Barcelona look like a walk in the park.

Manchester United now and Manchester United in 1986, when Ferguson took over, only have two things in common. The have the same name and they still play in red. Only Brian Clough, with some help from Peter Taylor, Don Revie and Sir Matt Busby have singularly transformed a club like SAF. The transformation of Liverpool was a combination of Shankly and his boot room and he was followed by Paisley, Fagan and Dalglish who, on the face of it, carried on the work started by Shankly.

To see what may be in store for United we need to take a look at the precedent set by Busby’s Manchester United, Don Revie’s Leeds, Cloughie’s Forest and the revolution Shankly started and Dalglish finished after a 4-4 draw with Everton.

Sir Matt Busby built Manchester United. He managed the club from 1945 to 1969 and pioneered European club football against the wishes of the Football Association. His first great team perished in Munich in 1958 and 10 years later his second great team lifted the Holy Grail on a warm night in North London. Six seasons later Manchester United was relegated to the second division by the back heel of Denis Law who had starred for United in the 68 European Cup Final. Busby stepped aside and moved upstairs at the end of the 69 season and was replaced by ex player Wilf McGuinness who was 31 at the time. By the time McGuinness was fired in December of 1970 he had gone grey! Busby came back for a while but wasn’t able to halt the slide. Manchester United won some trophies through the 70’s and 80’s but they didn’t win the league again until 1993, a gap of 26 years.

When Don Revie joined Leeds United in 1961 they were a small parochial second tier club in the north of England. When he left in 1974 they were a juggernaut. Often maligned, but grudgingly respected, Revie had built a dynasty. Revie won the English domestic championship twice and 5 times his Leeds team were runners up. Very often his small squad would dominate the league and be fighting in all competitions to be thwarted at the death. But year after year they would be back. Revie, due his acrimonious time as England manager is often overlooked in discussions of great managers, but there can be no denying he is up there with Herbert Chapman, Brian Clough and Alf Ramsey as the greatest of English managers. Revie left Leeds in 74 to manage England. He was replaced by his nemesis Brian Clough, who lasted 44 days! If you haven’t read the book or seen the film “The Damned United” it’s worth a look. Clough was replaced by Jimmy Adamson who took Revie’s team to a European Cup Final in 1975. Leeds were beaten 2-0 by Bayern and seven season later, after a crop of ex-players had unsuccessfully tried to manage the club, Leeds United were in the second tier of English football. Leeds have recovered and won the title again in 1992 but terrible financial management sees them currently in the second tier.

Brian Clough took Nottingham Forest from the second division of English football to back to back European Cups in the space of 5 years, winning the English Championship along the way. Clough, assisted by Peter Taylor joined Nottingham Forest in 1975 and the club was in a similar situation to Leeds when Revie had joined them. Clough succeeded where Revie failed by winning the European cup in 1979 and 1980. Clough left Forest in 1993 and in his final season in charge Forest were relegated. In truth his best years were past him. An ex player Frank Clarke took over and initially Forest had some success but it didn’t last and in a familiar fashion are now to be found in the second tier of English football.

The only dynasty to be carried forward to this point has been the legacy of Bill Shankly, but even here nothing lasts forever. Shankly joined Liverpool in 1959 and by the time of his departure in 1974, Liverpool was a domestic powerhouse. His successor from within the club was Bill Paisley. The key difference here is that Paisley was promoted from within but, he was already a part of the managerial hierarchy. Under Paisley Liverpool conquered Europe and became the top club on that continent. When Paisley stepped aside Joe Fagan, again from within and part of the structure, continued the charge. Joe Fagan resigned as Liverpool manager after the Heysel disaster in 1985. Kenny Dalglish took the reins and continued the dominance in England, as a result of the Heysel disaster English clubs were banned from European competition. Dalglish built a great team and Liverpool was still kings of England, but they were about to be deposed by their arch enemy along the East Lancs Road, Ale Ferguson’s Manchester United. After a 4-4 draw with Everton in February of 1991, Dalglish resigned citing the stress of the Hillsborough disaster where 96 football fans were crushed to death. There can be no doubt hat the Hillsborough disaster took a toll on Dalglish, but cracks were appearing at Anfiled. An ex player Graeme Souness took over, but Souness had no experience in the Liverpool management structure and although Liverpool have had some success since their last title win in 1990, Liverpool are still waiting for their next English title some 20 plus years later.

So where does that leave the current Champions of England. The threat to United isn’t their “noisy neighbours” as SAF likes to call Manchester City, nor is it the current European Champions Barcelona. The biggest threat that United face is life after Sir Alex Ferguson. It doesn’t seem to be much of a story at the moment but believe me it will be soon.

In my next blog, I will give you my thoughts on who will replace the irreplaceable….