Why Phil and Tony Had To Go

It was a shame to see Tony Adams fired the other day, but you could see it coming for weeks. He’s a nice guy, but never really looked the part as a Premier League manager. It’s going to prove very difficult for him to get a top-level managerial job again, because he’s now had two and neither of them have worked out. He was actually quite unfortunate at Pompey, because some of the performances were very spirited, but the results didn’t match. There was all kinds of bad defending going on. You can only stretch it out for so long, and once you’ve gone 10 or 12 games without a win, you’re bound to face the axe. Events might overtake me, but at the time of writing, I wouldn’t be surprised to see Avram Grant get the job – he’s a mate of the owner. Whether he’d be a good choice, I’m not so sure. He didn’t set the world alight at Chelsea.

Speaking of Chelsea, Phil Scolari was another sacking waiting to happen. I’ve gone into some detail before about the total lack of organisation from set-pieces, and I think the Hull result sealed his fate. As regards who’s going to replace him, there are a couple of Chelsea old boys who’ve done very well in management, and could be contenders for the vacancy, assuming Ray Wilkins doesn’t get it on a permanent basis. Gianfranco Zola has done brilliantly at West Ham, and Roberto Di Matteo has made a big impact at Milton Keynes. Zola’s made the Hammers very tactically sound, they’re very hard to break down, and his preparation is really detailed. You don’t want to get carried away on the basis of a couple of months, but from everything we’ve seen so far, he’s got what it takes. He’s had an instant, dramatic impact. Also, he has Steve Clarke as his No. 2, who was a big part of Chelsea’s success. He had a great relationship with the squad, and he’d still have a close affinity with several of the players. I know Clarkey, I’ve played with him, and he’s a top bloke who has a great banter with the lads. So Zola-Clarke as a Blues dream team isn’t far-fetched at all. Di Matteo’s done very well too, but at a much lower level, and I think he’ll need to take the Dons up and establish them in the Championship before he gets linked with the top jobs.
Gareth Southgate’s position at Middlesbrough is being questioned, but I’d say he’s still one of the safest managers in football, purely because he has the most patient chairman in England. Steve Gibson has never actually sacked a manager. He stood down Bryan Robson gently a few years ago, and brought in Venables, but it wasn’t a sacking. Normally when chairmen see relegation staring them in the face, they tend to press the panic button, but Gibson’s never done that. I think even if they went down, he wouldn’t fire Southgate, he would give him a chance to come back up. They’re just about the only club that still operate that way. The finances in football nowadays make it very hard for chairmen to be patient, because the financial losses are so huge if you lose your top-flight status.
As regards Shay Given’s transfer from Newcastle to Man City, it’s clearly a good move for him. He’s left a club that’s totally unambitious, and moved to one that’s extremely ambitious. Man City are obviously going to grow, keep spending their millions and getting in better players, and it’ll give Shay a spring in his step. He obviously wants to win trophies, which is understandable after 12 years of winning nothing. It became quite clear that none of the Big Four were going to come in for him, and I suppose the obvious next best option after the Big Four is Man City, with all the money that’s there. He had a great debut, and the fans have taken to him already. Shay’s fairly young for a goalkeeper; some of them keep improving until they’re 40. He makes very few mistakes, and there’s been days with Newcastle and Ireland when he’s kept his team in the match single-handedly. I think he can go on to reach the levels of Seaman, Schmeichel, Van der Sar and the like, and I’ve no doubt he’ll be worth a lot of points to City over the next few years.
I’ve noticed the Aston Villa fans are starting to sing about winning the League. They’re probably a bit too far behind Man U to do that, but they seem to be set for the Champions League. Martin O’Neill never ceases to amaze me with what he’s capable of, and I think he’ll hang in there and see if he can build a title-winning side. He has a good chairman, and a very spirited group of players who are clearly responding to his methods. They kill teams on the counter-atack, using the pace of Young and Agbonlahor on the wings, the way Chelsea were doing a few years ago with Robben, Duff and Wright-Phillips. If you’ve got that kind of pace, you have to use it, and Martin’s always been very adept at playing to his strengths.
Liverpool got out of jail the other day against Pompey. They won the match, but it needs saying that Benitez’s team selection was absolutely bizarre. They got away with it, thanks to Torres’s brilliance and a massive mistake from Distin, but a team that’s contending for the title shouldn’t be in the position of being 2-1 down to a team that haven’t won in two months. Rafa sounds less and less impressive as the season goes on, and I don’t think the win fooled anybody. Liverpool are a far cry from being Premiership champions.