BASTARDS, FOOLS & BOLLOXES

Who’d be a football manager? Well, actually, I wouldn’t mind being one myself, if it would mean assuming the mantle of Alex Ferguson at Man United, or Fabio Capello at A.C. Milan.

There are some stresses that I can handle quite easily, the agonising over whether to play Robson or Keane, Savicevic or Donadoni. Yes, I can take that kind of strain, I do believe.

The perennial issue of the unhappy lot of the football manager has been highlighted recently, with Graeme Souness being relieved of his duties at Liverpool, and the controversy surrounding the England job.

When, eventually, the Great Scorer comes to write the verdict on Souness, he or she will point to his lack of judgement in the transfer market, a rather unfortunate succession of injuries to important players, and the general problems of adjustment which must be tackled when a great club is in a period of transition.

This, however, would not tell the full story, because when the Great Scorer adds it all up, the bottom line will be that Souness had a personality problem.

And the personality problem he had, was that he was a bollocks.

It wasn’t that players suddenly rediscovered dormant energies when they were despatched from his regime, it was more a case that they were generally in a better frame of mind with one less daily dose of unnecessary grief in their lives.

Senior players like Rush, Barnes and Whelan may have had injury problems, but they never gave the impression that they were bursting every sinew of determination in order to do the business for The Boss.

Whelan, coincidentally, returned to the first team approximately one week after Souness’ departure, and showed some characteristically artful touches against Norwich. Ireland expects that he will consolidate this good form and eventually embarrass Jack into giving him a run in the USA.

The dead hand of Souness could be gauged in an aesthetic sense by the fact that these senior players somehow appeared much older than they actually are, when sent out to play under his stewardship.

Rather than being in the prime of their careers, they looked as though they were having a last lap of honour on the way to the cemetery.

Now that they are in the doldrums, I can confess to being a Liverpool fan since the distant days of Steve Heighway. Before this, you wouldn’t bother telling people that you supported Liverpool because they would say, “So fucking what?” The Pool were winning everything before them, and it is somehow more interesting to be a fan of grotty little teams like Bournemouth, than an omnipotent trophy-swallowing beast.

I felt in my water that the appointment of the outgoing bollocks was an injudicious one, and I now look forward to a period of resurgence under Roy Evans, a true son of the Boot Room.

Having a bollocks as a manager, of course, need not be a crushing impediment. Brian Clough was a bit of a bollocks, but he was also as mad as a March Hare, which added an ameliorating dimension.

He was more of a Mad Bastard than a thorough going bollocks, and in footballing terms, you can live with a Mad Bastard.

You can not, however, live with a total pillock, at the mention of which, enter Graham Taylor, bellowing, “do I not like that!!”

The Channel 4 documentary on England in the time of Taylor has now entered into folklore as an unparalleled study of the manager as doomed motherfucker.

He wasn’t a particularly nice guy, and he wasn’t together enough to be a bollocks. He was worse than this, he was a fool.

His successor, El Tel, is no mug, and seems like a reasonable sort of character. If he has a major personality flaw, it seems to reside in a curious inability to add, as well as to subtract, divide, and multiply.

I bow to the wisdom of the football Association in appointing a manager whose demeanour doesn’t immediately make you want to guffaw, while taking note of their latent suicidal tendencies, by offering us a supremo who may provide some terrific amusement off the park, and in the courts.

An intriguing 50-50 ball. It is the England way.

Barrister alert! Barrister alert! With an Offaly hurler being awarded some £5,000 in compensation for an assault committed in the course of a Stickfighting orgy, we are looking at a situation where the term “open the floodgates” takes on a quite monstrous aspect.

In musty little offices all over rural Ireland, greedy lawyers are preparing for a manic spree of ambulance-chasing, and the average G.A.A. club will be paying insurance premiums akin to those which ought to be levied on a cyanide factory.

Jesus H. Christ, a barrister’s cut for damages awarded after just one hurling match in Wicklow could amount to a seven-figure sum at this rate.

If the words, “I’ll see you in Court” start pressing on the consciousness of Bogball and Stickfighting exponents, a whole new bonanza will accrue which could be the salvation of rural Ireland itself.

With billions of pounds at stake, Gaelic Games will once more become an irresistible, if high-risk activity. “Slashers Win County Final – Lose £548,000” the headlines will say.

Now, on the playing fields of Erin, where there’s muck, there’s brass. •