Redknapp Sacked by Spurs

I didn’t expect to be having to write this blog today. The news is filtering through that Harry Redknapp has been sacked by Spurs after failing to guide the side to Champions League football last season. There have been rumours of trouble for a couple of weeks now after Tottenham suffered a horrendous slump in form towards the end of the season, going from a clear third place to finishing a close fourth in the space of three months.

Harry Redknapp is left to ponder his next career move after being shown the exit at Spurs.

Of course much of that lack of form was brought about because of off-the-field issues. Firstly, ‘Arry had his day in court fighting charges of tax evasion before his well publicised courtship of the England manager’s post. He gambled his entire career on getting that job but sadly the gamble appears to have backfired. His behaviour over the past couple of months has been getting stranger and stranger as he veered from denying and then confirming his interest in the England job, stating that he would most likely sell most of Tottenham’s best players and then just this week saying that he wasn’t going to resign his post at White Hart Lane, basically offering Spurs the chance to sack him.

Those who know me will know that I’m not Redknapp’s biggest fan. I think that he’s over-rated having spent vast amounts of money for a moderate amount of success. That being said, I will defend his record at Spurs vehemently. He has galvanised a team that a few seasons ago looked like they were going to languish in mid-table and has turned them into genuine top four contenders. I think Spurs will find it difficult to replace him and tonight’s events could end up being a disaster for both parties. I can’t wait to hear what he’s got to say on the matter and where his next move lays – maybe a spell abroad?

David Moyes could be Redknapp’s replacement.

So where do Tottenham turn now? Well the early runaway favourite is Everton’s David Moyes. Moyes is one of my favourite managers in the Premier League and the complete opposite to Redknapp. He’s shy, thinks before he speaks and has achieved minor miracles at Everton on a shoestring budget. He guided them to their staple 7th place in the league (above arch-rivals Liverpool) and has got them playing some lovely stuff. I just think that Spurs will be simply too different to Everton. Moyes is in a good place at Goodison Park and we’ve seen how managers who are nicely bedded at their club leave and end up being failures at their new club (Hodgson at Liverpool, Hughes at City etc…) I can see Moyes ruining his chances of the Man United job (the one he really wants) with a terrible spell at Spurs but on the other hand it could be the thrust into the big time that he deserves.

I think he’d relish the chance to work with the young, talented team that Tottenham have and he might even be able to persuade a few of his Everton boys to follow him down to London. I’m just not convinced that Moyes would want to leave Everton yet. I’m sure he sees them as deserving of a place in the top four and won’t leave until they get there. Whatever happens, this story has massive implications for the start of the season and Spurs fans will be hoping an appointment is made swiftly.

The Premier League Can No Longer Lay Claim to Being the Best League in the World

For a long time now there has been an arrogance in English football that the English Premier League is the best league in the world. The clubs, the players, the media and the fans all are entirely convinced that the football they are seeing is better than anything else out there. Yet, with only one English club left in any European competition, can that still be the case?

The logo depicts itself as a beacon to the rest of the footballing world, but just how true is that?

There was a time when that was certainly true. The days of Ronaldo, Tevez and Rooney at United and Drogba, Terry and Lampard all in form at Chelsea proved that no-one could touch the Premier League. In addition, there were Liverpool, Arsenal and Spurs sides who were improving all the while and a tightness around the mid-table. All this culminated in the 2008 Champions League final in Moscow between, you guessed it, Man United and Chelsea. The tight 1-1 draw followed by United edging the penalty shootout was supposed to reflect the fact that at the pinnacle of English football the defences are rock solid, the midfield is a fountain of creativity and the strikers are capable of the most spectacular goals. Of course what we know now is that Premier League football has a habit of being defensive and at times desperate.

This isn’t a problem confined to the Premier League though. Serie A, once that brilliant and unpredictable league that everyone tucked into their Sunday lunch with, now is a shadow of its former self. Where the best players in the world once roamed, only a few really top class players remain and the game is still trying to forget the unfortunate match-fixing scandal of a few year’s ago. I’m not saying that English clubs are going to get embroiled in anything like that but a look north of the border at what has happened to Rangers might just provide a wake up call to many of the teams. If just one big club goes under and there is an outflow of the foreign owners, what will happen then?

I’ve been banging on to anyone who’ll listen that the Spanish became the home of the best football on the planet as soon as Real Madrid and Barcelona opened their pockets and brought players such as Cristiano Ronaldo, Kaka, Alexis Sanchez, Fabregas and Xabi Alonso over to La Liga. Having the three best players in the world for the last few seasons playing in La Liga has raised the entire standard of Spanish football. Por ejemplo (full of surprises aren’t I?) just look at Atheltic Bilbao’s brutal dismantling of Manchester United a few weeks ago. United, leading the Premier League and supposedly England’s best club, were outplayed and out-thought both at home and away. Bilbao played some scintillating stuff while United very often resorted to long ball tactics – not exactly dynamic is it? Meanwhile, Bilbao have tonight secured their place in the semi-finals of the Europa League with another impressive win over Schalke. This from a team who three years ago played a friendly against my local team, Colchester United and were very much cannon fodder for the bigger clubs in Spain until recently. The real issue though is that we’ve lost quality from the Premier League. People can point to Van Persie,Aguero and Silva but none of them have the impact that Ronaldo did at United or that Henry did at Arsenal. In Ronaldo and Henry, the Premier League had its first two players who could potentially be labelled in the ‘greatest ever’ category but inevitably they had to move on at some point and the Premier League just hasn’t been able to lure a player of that calibre since.

Fernando Torres' lack of form symbolises the plight of the Premier League

That has led to the league becoming tighter and in some people’s eyes better. I think it’s great to see teams like Newcastle and Spurs becoming genuine fourth place contenders but that sort of system has been in place for years in Spain. Valencia, Villareal, Atletico Madrid and Sevilla regularly fought it out for the European places over the past few seasons. I think another issue with the Premier League is that we have a lot of big names over here, on big pay packets but they’re not in their peak like they are over in Spain. Torres, Terry, Ferdinand, Berbatov, Drogba and Gerrard would have been the most desirable collectibles in the Panini sticker album a few seasons ago but now they’re out of form and looking old. I know that most people say that the only reason La Liga is so popular now is down to Messi and Ronaldo. But if you look beyond them, beyond Real Madrid and Barcelona even and you can still see real talent. There’s Iker Muniain at Bilbao, Falcao at Atletico Madrid, Roberto Soldado at Valencia, Jeremy Toulalan, Ruud Van Nistelrooy and Julio Baptista at Malaga and Jesus Navas at Sevilla. Almost every team has a talisman who could make the jump over to anywhere in European football and I can’t really see someone like Tim Cahill doing that – sorry Everton fans. The depth of the league isn’t quite up to the level of late 80s/early 90s Serie A but it’s getting there.

Lionel Messi, just one of the many reasons why La Liga is so entertaining

The style of football is also much prettier on the eye over there. I’m very much someone who’d appreciate a 0-0 draw full of attacking, quick passing football instead of a 2-0 win that was claimed through dull passages of play and physical football. People fawn over Barcelona’s style but watch Revista de La Liga and the majority of teams play football like that, it’s just that Barcelona do it better. The closest we have to that here are Arsenal, Swansea and Man City but only when they’re on form. I’ve just lost faith in the English game and am genuinely fearful that if we get far enough to play Spain at Euro 2012 that we’ll be completely slaughtered in front of millions of viewers. I’d dare say Germany would do the same – the Bundesliga is becoming a cracking little league too. Dortmund have a young, brilliant team while Bayern are a match for Barcelona and Madrid for the title of best all-round unit.

I’m not saying that the Premier League is the worst league in European football, far from it actually, but we just need to stop this attitude that just because our league is the richest in the world, it doesn’t make it the best. Chelsea, Man City and United can have all the millions in the world but without a player to match Messi then they might as well have nothing. Coming onto Barcelona I’d like to say that they were an absolute joy to watch the other night against Milan. Messi, Xavi and Iniesta will be remembered as three Gods of the game. It’s also important to remember that they beat a strong Milan side without 20 goal a season man David Villa and without a recognised left-back. Chelsea will give it their best, as they always do, but I fully expect them to be taught a footballing lesson by the Catalan giants. Those four years since Moscow must feel like an awful long time ago….

The Return of the Prodigal Son

Tevez helped City to a 2-1 win last night but can the events of the past really be forgotten?

What a difference a month makes. Four weeks ago and Carlos Tevez had just returned to Manchester after his lengthy AWOL period in Argentina. With his tail between his legs, he made a grovelling apology to the club, the fans and manager Roberto Mancini. Last night Tevez returned to action, ironically coming off the bench, and set up Samir Nasri for the winning goal against Chelsea. It was the final step of Tevez’s reintegration with his team and the talk is now of Tevez powering City to their first Premier League title. My question is, do they really need him?

I can’t imagine many of the City first team welcoming Tevez back with open arms after he deserted them last September. That tension permeated the club and may have cost them against Swansea a couple of weeks ago. Tevez is not a different person, he is just back because he realised that no other club could afford to take him away from the Etihad. He needs to prove that he is willing to give 100% for the club, he needs to show passion and commitment whenever he steps on the pitch. I’d still treat him as if he’s ready to throw his toys out of the pram at any second and if it does then Mancini’s big gamble will have backfired spectacularly; what’s more is that any whiff of conflict between Tevez and his manager or teammates and the momentum swings back in United’s favour. Mancini is going to have to manage a very delicate balancing act here.

Don’t get me wrong, Tevez is a great player and any team would want him on their books but City coped perfectly well without him for the last six months.  They became a solid unit and despite losing the lead in the title race, they were still favourites to be crowned Champions come May. Mario Balotelli was finally getting his head down and putting in some important performances, will he now be left to rot on the bench while Tevez steals all the glory? Will Tevez himself be happy to be used in a rotation system when that was what got him all riled up six months ago?

We’ve seen clubs throw away their title chances time and time again: Newcastle, Arsenal, Chelsea and even Manchester United. The most common factor in their decline was over-tinkering and Manchester City could easily find themselves going the same way. Aguero, Balotelli and Tevez could in theory fill the slots in a 4-3-3 but City have been brilliant with their fluid 4-5-1 all season and who then would Mancini drop from the midfield in order to placate Tevez? The little Argentinian (Tevez, not Aguero) isn’t even at full fitness yet and a yard of pace could be the difference between 1 point and 3; with United looking so strong at the moment, every point counts.

Expect Mancini to go greyer before the end of the season

Yet Mancini could still turn Tevez into the most important player in the team. If I was Roberto, I’d use Tevez as a distraction. Take last night for example, the cameras were focused on Tevez even if as much as coughed and no-0ne remembers Aguero’s equalising penalty as well as the number of other chances he had. If you have the threat of Tevez on the bench, teams will have to come up with a plan to stop him just in case he comes on – that removes time for them to be focusing on your actual starting XI. Let Aguero and Balotelli get the early goals and bring Tevez on as an impact sub. If he impresses, give him a start here and there. Simple.

What interested me though about last night, and gave an insight into how little Mancini trusts Tevez’s fitness right now, was when he substituted Balotelli for Gareth Barry at half-time. You’ve got a world-class striker on the bench who is raring to go and he brings on a central midfielder. Maybe it was used to show Tevez that his road to regular football won’t be an easy one to walk but clearly there is still some resentment from Mancini to Tevez. The fans won’t forget what he did and unless he starts banging in the goals, they’ll be on his back straightaway.

Tevez doesn’t really change anything in regards to where the Premier League trophy is heading at the end of this season. The deciding game will still be City vs United on Monday 30th April but he could provide that extra talent that gives City the advantage. Conversely, he could just decide that Manchester is not really his scene and head off back to Argentina again. City have to face Stoke, Arsenal and Newcastle away before the end of the season while United have a much kinder run-in. Sir Alex Ferguson will be eyeing the return of Tevez intently, looking for any sign of trouble that he can exploit. Tevez cannot expect to waltz back into first team football and the affections of the City fans and Mancini has to ensure that he stays in control, that the players do not become distracted from their goal. Like I said, Tevez is a gamble but the rewards are enormous if it pays off.

Villas-Boas let down by Chelsea

So the inevitable has happened: Andre Villas-Boas has been sacked as Chelsea manager. Things never really worked out for him did they? It’s a strange feeling for me because I’m not a Chelsea fan but I do have very passionate views about how that team should be playing and I also think Villas-Boas is the most talented manager to emerge in the Premier League for many many years.

Andre Villas-Boas in happier times. Have Chelsea made a fatal mistake?

Villas-Boas’ achievements at Porto are well documented: going an entire season unbeaten, winning four trophies in the same season and playing some lovely stuff while doing so. He had a squad that understood the nuances of the game; who understood that modern football is akin to a game of chess and that the manager has to be prepared to outmanoeuvre  his counterpart at all times. He had a way of explaining his notoriously complex scout reports to his players and that is what was missing at Chelsea. It seems that Villas-Boas lacked the ability to connect to his players (maybe he didn’t fancy going out and sleeping with a girl or three?) and you get the impression that he was as isolated as a teacher at the front of an unruly year 9 class. His differences of opinion with Frank Lampard have been well documented and when you alienate one member of the ‘old school’ Chelsea then you alienate them all.

I think that’s my main issue with Chelsea at the moment. They haven’t adapted since Mourinho left at all. There is the excuse that no manager has been able to settle into the job long enough to change things but seriously, it’s been five years since Mourinho left and that squad won’t win the league. Terry, Lampard, Cole, Drogba and Malouda are all past it and should have been sold last season; keeping them there prevents improvement and is the reason why Chelsea have stagnated in recent years while Man City and Spurs have leapfrogged them. Mata was a good buy but he cannot turn a team around. If he is still having to play balls to a slow and misfiring Drogba and an off-colour Torres then it just won’t work. Torres is another sore point for me. His lack of form all started when Spain rushed him back to play in the World Cup and while it’s completely understandable that he would want to play every game, he was not integral to the success of the team and should have sat out the group stages. Why pundits still debate the cause of Torres’ lack of form is a mystery to me as it was plainly obvious that he was bereft of confidence to anyone who watched the World Cup. I always felt that Torres was a player who relied on being re-assured that he was brilliant and that if he felt he wasn’t all that then his performance would drop off the cliff. When he returned to Liverpool, he wasn’t given enough time to find that confidence on the training pitch before the season began. The £50 million that Abramovich paid Liverpool for him was scandalous (mind you, the £35 million for Carroll wasn’t exactly well spent) but I’m sure part of the reason Villas-Boas took the job was that he felt he could turn Torres’ Chelsea career around. In that respect he failed.

Chelsea and Abramovich let Villas-Boas down too. A lack of support in the transfer market (probably due to Torres) meant that Chelsea could not strengthen all the positions that they needed to which meant an over-reliance on the ‘old school’ which limited Villas-Boas’ creativity. He couldn’t play a fast-paced and slick passing game because he couldn’t trust the fitness of his older players. The way Terry has capitulated this season sums it all up – never before has he looked as shaky at the back as he had in the last few months and the team lacks a defensive partnership. They should be employing a formation where one wing back and one centre back stay back at all times while the other two push forward while Meireles (potentially a superb signing) cuts out anything heading into Chelsea’s half. I think had he been able to do things his way, Villas-Boas would have employed a tactic similar to that. The major issue though is how to remove that ‘old school’. Do you wait for them to retire, rewarding their loyalty to the club by letting them see their careers out there? Or do you force them out and risk alienating the fans – imagine the reaction if Terry was sold! People may point to United bringing Scholes out of retirement successfully but the ginger maestro did have six months to have a rest… Even Giggs, the king of longevity, plays once every two or three games, not every game like the elderly Chelsea players have to. Honestly, sometimes they are eerily reminiscent of the Chelsea pensioners.

No doubt Abramovich already has someone lined up for the post. The bookies have Benitez as favourite, while the fans will clamour for Mourinho and the fact that Abramovich has hired Di Matteo until the end of the season suggests that he is prepared to wait until Mourinho has conquered Spain before making an offer. Whoever the new man in charge is has to do a spot of spring cleaning and has to be strong enough to introduce a new philosophy to the club and stick to it no matter how much the fans protest.

Will Mourinho make a triumphant return to the Premier League?

In other news, Terry Butcher has declared the search for the next England manager ‘a farce’ – a point I am inclined to agree with. I am in favour of teams taking their time over selecting a new manager but when it is the national team, there has to be a certain amount of information distributed through the media – of which there has been none. All the reports are obviously saying that Redknapp is the man for the job but there has still been no approach. I’m sure the FA are working out how they can afford to pay for him and his backroom staff but all this is doing is adding to the unease amongst the fans and the players. With the squad losing their concentration in injury time on Wednesday, strong leadership will be the priority for Euro 2012. But before we all announce the arrival of King ‘Arry are we forgetting that a successful manager who relishes working with talented, young and determined players has just become available? May I make the case for Andre Villas-Boas. He could get England playing some lovely stuff and could mould the mish-mash of young talent that we have inherited at the moment into a cohesive unit. What’s more, with no billionaire chairman telling him who to sign, who to play and who to drop he will be able to do his own thing and as we saw with Porto, that can be devastatingly successful. Something to think about…