The FA’s decision to appoint a ‘world-class’ manager is a good one but makes me wonder what the previous paradigm might’ve been. A ‘jittery’ manager? A ‘malleable’ manager? A ‘nice’ manager? The manager of a team of millionaire athletes needs to be big. And preferably swarthy. When was the last time England had a manager with even an ounce of ‘swarth’? McClaren if confronted with swarth would piddle. Sven was chic but at the last World Cup Big Phil Scolari’s low-swinging sack of swarth sent his tackle on an inward flight. Keegan, Hoddle, Taylor, Robson, all lovely in their way but compared to a gent with Mourinho’s obvious sass unlikely to scorch the retina.
I’ve been dying for an opportunity to like Mourinho ever since he entered the English game but his position at the Bridge meant mine remained a secret and shameful affection. I squirmed like Humbert Humbert when he announced his own and Barcelona’s teams a day before their infamous Camp Nou clash – ‘Oooh he’s such a dirty tinker.’ Mind games and arrogance are an intriguing and beguiling brew, even from the manager of a detested rival club.
If he were to be appointed it would legitimise my interest, like a knicker thief suddenly made manager of a launderette my prurience would be seen as diligence – ‘I was merely sniffing to see if the Lenor had worked.’ The position requires a substantial character. One can only truly love someone if they exist to some degree outside the sphere of your control; if in a relationship you can dominate someone completely how can they offer salvation? How can they place their self between you and death?
I bet if you went out with Mourinho he’d never call back when you wanted him to, he’d flirt with other people and sometimes just broodily stare off into the distance and when you asked what was wrong say ‘Nothing’ – all moodily. McClaren would bring you breakfast in bed wearing a novelty pinny. The England team would have to respect José, he’d demand it and whilst I suspect there was some breakdown in his relationship with senior Chelsea players towards the end of his tenure that, in my opinion, is because he was sabotaged.
That wouldn’t happen at England. Sir Trevor Brooking will do a wonderful job in the meantime as a caretaker, he was marvellous at West Ham; revealing unimagined inner wrath on the touchline, it was like seeing a deputy headmaster gobbing at Hell’s Angels.
I think the FA should do whatever it takes to get Mourinho, not just because of my silly crush but because I think he could galvanise our crestfallen nation. He could handle the press, the players, the ever-shifting tactical requirements and I don’t think we’re in any position to quibble about flamboyant football, what we need is success.
It’ll be a drag watching events in Austria and Switzerland next year while the English game thumbs its impotent crutch but knowing that José was at the foot of the bed in a baby doll nightie would make the process seem almost tantalising.
18
Barwick must atone for the sins of his fathers
Brian Clough, for all his extraordinary achievements as a player and a manager, is still often remembered as the best manager England never had. I am reading Duncan Hamilton’s Provided You Don’t Kiss Me, in which he chronicles 20 years of interviewing Clough whilst, initially, working for a local Nottingham newspaper. I’ve not yet progressed beyond the early chapters so Clough is still in his prime; virile, volatile, passionate and frequently unreasonable.
What I enjoy most about this beautifully written and tender account of the relationship between a nervous young nit of a provincial reporter and a football genius is the sense of genuine proximity to its subject, so that Clough’s obvious flaws seem forgivable and even beguiling, rather than cruel and unbearable.
‘Mourinho’s future is yet to be written but let’s insist that it is strewn with leading Blighty to glory’
In the introduction Hamilton recounts an occasion where, whilst he was still in his teens, Old Big ‘Ead viciously coated him off in the home changing room in front of the wet and nude first team, effin’ and blindin’ with such ferocity that he feared for his safety while Garry Birtles stared embarrassed at his own nude tootsies. The severity was such that Hamilton assumed that his relationship with Nottingham Forest was finished forever. Naturally, within 24 hours, Clough had called instructing him to get to the City Ground at once and that the argument had been a mere trifle.
From what I’ve read so far this is a wonderful book but I suppose I ought to reserve judgement – perhaps in later chapters Hamilton loses all regard for his work and just scrawls slogans across the page in nail varnish, which would be absurd and not altogether unrewarding. What I can be assured of is that Clough will descend into alcoholism and stay at Forest for 18 months longer than he should have, which gives even these early episodes a hue of sadness.
I’m a shade too young to have been fully cognisant of goings-on at FA headquarters at the time that Clough ought to have been made national manager, but have strong memories of his enormous and compelling personality. Once, during a non-aggressive pitch invasion, I think after Forest had won an important cup tie, he clipped one of his own supporters round the ear like an aggressive dad. He was a very potent man with an incredible life force and often such characters are sniped at and undermined rather than elevated and celebrated.
In his pomp Clough would’ve been a marvellous England manager – he vibrated on a plane of consciousness that made him a formidable leader but unnerved administrators. It is widely assumed that the reason he didn’t get the job is because the FA didn’t think they’d be able to control him – and they probably couldn’t have. That’s one of the reasons he’d’ve been bloody good.
If you have not yet guessed that I’m building towards a rather grand fanfare in support of the appointment of José Mourinho then you don’t deserve a newspaper and I suggest you take this copy of the Guardian, God’s newspaper I call it, and thrust it into the palms of an orphan who will be grateful for the nourishment. I think that by appointing Mourinho we can as a nation atone for the criminal neglect of Clough’s talent. Mourinho is his natural heir, more than Martin O’Neill, who admittedly played under him, more than any of the potential candidates. Who could be better? Who could inspire a nationwide buzz in the way that the sexy dog smuggler has so effortlessly done? Wenger or Ferguson? Why, they only have one European Cup between them and two full-time jobs.
I read that Brian Barwick, when asked about the likelihood of Mourinho being offered the job, just stared into space and mumbled bizarrely. Well, that’s the wrong attitude, no one ever got anywhere by staring into space and mumbling bizarrely except, maybe, Nostradamus, but it is more for his perspicacity that he is admired than his mumbling and staring. Barwick must immediately cease this mumbling and staring and get on the phone and avenge the errors of the past and give us something to feel optimistic about.
Mourinho’s future is yet to be written but let’s insist that it is strewn with leading Blighty to glory. Let’s as a nation embrace unique and gifted individuals rather than suspiciously eyeing them as they subdue unspent ambition with toxic, bottled anaesthetic.
19
Capello’s trunks more titillating than his titles
I suppose my feelings about the FA’s failure to appoint José Mourinho exposes me as a rather shallow man influenced by the media, hyperbole and sexual charisma. Of course Mourinho is an exceptional coach but my interest in him being the national manager was enhanced dramatically by the convenient legitimisation that the appointment would’ve given my prurient interest.
I’m trying to get into the spirit of Fabio Capello’s coronation but in spite of his incredible success he isn’t a titillating choice. Whilst reading about his triumphs across Europe, the facts with which we are all now familiar, having received a crash course as a nation – nine titles at four clubs, one European Cup, he likes the art of Kandinsky and Chagall – made little impression. In fact I was much more interested in the photo of him as a youth diving into the sea.
Ah, the power of the image. He can top as many leagues as he likes and dev
our modern art with the rapacity of a Shoreditch fire but unless I get a snap of him in his trunks he can eff off. I was aware of Capello as a successful coach of Milan then as an opponent to David Beckham in Castilla. He said Beckham would never again play in the white shirt – people are always saying that to Beckham, he should work for Daz; no matter how much mud people sling at him he turns up a few days later in a pristine white top and saves the world. I hope the Ku Klux Klan don’t learn of his abilities, they’ll make him a grand wizard and the unity for which we’ve all toiled will go right down the plughole as racism is suddenly made to seem fun.
‘I would query the rationale of promoting a product with an image so arresting the subject becomes irrelevant’
Them briefs he had on were pretty spick and span an’ all. With my easily stirred devotion to image he can count himself fortunate that I don’t embark on a campaign to have his gorgeous knob made England boss; him sat there all seductive and reclined, his goolies bunched up into a taut smurf hat between his thighs. I think the ad is for the pants but I would query the rationale of promoting a product with an image so arresting that the subject of the advert becomes irrelevant. When I see that ad I don’t think ‘Oooh, I must get myself some pants’ I think ‘Oooh, I wonder if I’m gay.’ I’d never wear them pants, I’d feel the pants would be judging me – ’Well these balls certainly aren’t golden, they’d be lucky to get a bronze.’
Capello for most of us is as untarnished as David’s ballbag; a blank canvas upon which sharp lines of success can be etched or vague, blurred draws and losses can be rendered. When I first see a beautiful woman my mind floods with expectation and I project a future onto her perfect form; ‘She could be salvation, a secular saint, the answer to my murmured prayers’ then we embark on a journey that can only lead to disappointment just as certainly as the agonising euphoria of birth is death’s first klaxon.
What will we and our red-topped spokespeople make of this apparently educated and brilliant man? Will he be Fabio-lous or Crappello? I no longer care that he’s not English – the idea of an English manager being a prerequisite was ground into the dirt like a dog-end with kid’s knickers in its garage by the God-awful period under Steve McClaren.
Only Paul Ince seems bothered saying ‘it’s a damning endikement of our game’ or something but given Ince’s ‘previous’ around ties and loyalty – turning up in a United top after making all manner of oaths and pledges to a future at West Ham – we can rinse his comments down the same lavvy my childhood love of him was bitterly flushed.
It’s going to be a little while before any of this matters with a barren few years for England but in the Premiership we have an enthralling weekend ahead of us – West Ham will avenge their midweek defeat when Everton come to Upton Park today and tomorrow the ‘big four’ are all at it in an incestuous riot of money and hype.
Plus Joe Cole came and saw me do stand-up the other night, a man who left the Boleyn with his head held high and his integrity unblemished. So let’s not get too worked up about Capello for a while, let’s lose ourselves in the national game and use the holidays as an opportunity to ask some pretty searching questions about latent homosexuality. Merry Christmas.
Interview between Russell Brand and James Corden
RB: Do you think Zola is going to be good for West Ham?
JC: I do, I do. It’s funny, I looked at some West Ham message boards last night and I saw these fans were saying, ‘He’s only using the club as a stepping stone to manage Chelsea.’
RB: Mmm.
JC: And I kind of thought, if he comes and manages our club and in four years’ time, three years’ time, at any point Chelsea are interested in him to manage their club, he’s probably done a really good job for us.
RB: Yeah.
JC: And they’re not going to be interested in him if we get relegated or we don’t really do anything, so you have to give him the benefit of the doubt and go, well everyone has to have a first job at some point, and yeah he might be brilliant or he might not. I just always think you should be positive until you’re shown otherwise. It’s odd what’s happening at the club because it seems like they just want a coach and not a manager as we’ve always known it, who’s someone who buys the players and is in charge of the absolute running of the whole team. It seems the club are going to buy the players and Zola will coach them. It might be the best thing that’s ever happened to us or it might be the worst, nothing is guaranteed in football at all really.
RB: I think that he’s a charismatic and likeable figure, Zola.
JC: Mmm.
RB: The Chelsea connection is troubling but it’s lovely, he is at least an affable likeable man.
JC: Yeah.
RB: And I think that’s a good point you’ve made…because I’m really fond of the role of the gaffer, the, you know, the Alex Fergusons, these characters that have absolute control. It’s sad, the erosion of that office is one of the sad things about football, I think.
JC: Absolutely, yeah, yeah.
RB: I didn’t like it at the World Cup when you’d see Bobby Robson and they’d say he’s the England coach, no he ain’t, they’re managers.
JC: Yeah, they’re managers. The coach always sounds like he’s your PE teacher who coaches the team on a Sunday.
RB: Yeah.
JC: I kind of believe in this, in Trapattoni, er no, not Trapattoni, oh who’s the guy?
RB: Nani?
JC: Yeah, Nani, I believe in him, I have a good feeling about him and he worked very closely with Fabio Capello.
RB: Really?
JC: Yeah, ultimately it’s about feeling…the ultimate feeling, because the most consistent feeling of being a West Ham fan is that you can’t help feel that we squandered so much.
RB: Yeah.
JC: Of course, that great crop of players we had come through, we squandered that, and then things like buying Freddie Ljungberg.
RB: Yeah.
JC:…and then paying to release him, or paying Gary Breen forty grand a week and things like that, it seems that we’ve just squandered either talent or money.
RB: I always feel being a West Ham fan is like an almost exact paradigm of being an England fan, I mean the constant disappointment.
JC: Yeah.
RB: Always being let down.
JC: Yeah.
RB: Occasional flashes where you get optimistic.
JC: Yeah.
RB: Mates of mine that support Arsenal or United or Chelsea, I think well at least when we’re having trouble with England you’ve fucking got club football, we have the exact same experience, but with club football, oh no!
JC: I go to a lot of games with a really good friend of mine called Gavin, it was him who kind of introduced me to West Ham really, and he said this season he would love us to be in a relegation battle and I said, ‘Why?’ and he said, ‘Well, just ‘cos it’s exciting.’
RB: Yeah.
JC: And I would rather have excitement than what we had last year, just kind of being mediocre, just mid-table, that sort of safety thing. He said, ‘It doesn’t really thrill me, the safety of that.’ I’m not sure I agree, I mean relegation battles are great if you beat Man United on the last day with a player that you don’t legally own, that’s great fun.
RB: James, you like me are a gentleman off the television who supports West Ham United. What’s it like when you go to matches now that you are famous?
JC: Do you know what, it’s kind of quite nice because West Ham fans seem to really like people who are on the telly who support West Ham, do you know what I mean?
RB: Yeah.
JC: They really seem to like it. So people are always positive and nice and just seem to want to have a picture on their camera phone and be very nice and say that they like the show, or say how terrible it is that Matt Horn’s character in the show, Gavin, supports Tottenham so blatantly in the show and that’s about it, that’s all they tend to say really, you know. I never feel like, ‘Oooh this isn’t very saf
e.’ I tell you the best atmosphere I’ve ever felt was at an away game at Villa and obviously at an away game you have no choice over where you sit.
RB: Yeah.
JC: I was sat amongst some people who looked like the most brutal and hard-nosed people you’ve ever seen but I’ve never felt more safe really. It feels like you’re one of them.
RB: Yeah. It’s nice to have that. Affinity is good to have, something that is grounding. One of the things I enjoy is being lost in the crowd.
JC: Yeah.
RB: And at half time maybe sign a few programmes or whatever but…
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