If you met a soccer manager....

[beancounter]

I think he need to re read the post, the word ''rubbish'' was not mentioned.

No you're right, the word "failed" was used, that's completely different isn't it

bc

 

[Hilldodger]

I've met the Derby manager a few times. He's a nice enough bloke but I'd no idea who he was until afterwards!

 

[Globalti]

Another question: do these blokes ever smile? I've only ever seen them chewing and scowling. Maybe smiling is a sign of weakness?

 

[4F]

Another question: do these blokes ever smile? I've only ever seen them chewing and scowling. Maybe smiling is a sign of weakness?

Maybe because the game is driven by money and the fact that it does not take many bad results for the club to axe a manager. However Bobby Robson was always smiling and one of the nicest blokes you could wish to meet.

 

[mangaman]

By failed do you mean that they were not good at playing football? I'd be inclined to agree to some extent.

The absolute greats of football management never really had a brillant career playing football.

I disagree. There's not a clear correlation.

Brian Clough was a brilliant player cut short in his prime by injury
Kenny Dalgleish was a brilliant player and both won the league with different clubs

Fabio Capello made nearly 300 apperances in Serie A with Roma, Juventus and Milan winning 4 league titles as a player and played 32 times for Italy - he seems a decent manager!

Of course there are some - like Mourinho who hardly played.

And most, I suspect, like Alex Ferguson, who had average but respectable careers in pro football as players but never really hit the big time.

 

[Greedo]

I love football but seeing as I'm 37 I think I'm well by the stage of being impressed or overwhelmed by meeting anyone regarding the job they do.

There are some fine managers out there but would just enjoy meeting them as much as I enjoy meeting someone else who isn't well known.

 

[Globalti]

Ooh yes, I remember now... I was round at my first GF's house in Newcastle in the late 70s when a skinny blond bloke dropped in to see her Dad. Everyone was agog except me because apparently he was a Newcastle United player. I wonder who that was?

More recently I met Francois Pienaar in South Africa and found him a fantastic bloke but he's a rugby player, that much I do know.

 

[threebikesmcginty]

Jackie Charlton sat next to me in a bar in Ireland once - he seemed like a decent sort. We didn't talk about our work - he didn't mention football and I didn't talk about wood!

 

[4F]

We didn't talk about our work - he didn't mention football and I didn't talk about wood!

Are you a porn star ?

 

[Piemaster]

I like to think that I wouldn't be impressed by anyone simply because of their job.
To tar all managers as gum chewing alpha males is simply stereotyping.
Some would be interesting and others not.
To name but a few, Sven Goran Erikson, Benitez, Mourinho are multi-lingual intelligent men.
Iain Dowie has a masters degree in engineering, as hass quiet spoken Steve Coppell. Alan Curbishley is a quiet, thoughtful man.
If I found myself in a room with a male ballet dancer I'd have nothing obviously in common but I don't think I'd jump to the conclusion that he must be a mincing camp follower.

Nicely summed up. I'd not be over/under - whelmed by meeting any of the above but I'd quite like a chat over a beer with any of the intelligent and knowledgeable people above. There is a difference between the stress of touchline behaviour and the interviews they give.

I'm mostly impressed by personal achievements in overcoming mental and physical toughness - medals awarded for courage to troops in Afghanistan, Eddy Izzards marathon runs. Stuff where body and mind are yelling 'STOP!' but you do it anyway.

 

[Slowgrind]

Impressed. The manager of the team I support sent me a card which he'd got all his players to sign. I get the strong impression he genuinely cares about his fans and in return, in the main, we care about him.

Last year I was at deaths door for a few weeks.
I'm an Evertonian but I like to watch any team that can put on a good display of football.
When I was at my lowest ebb a guy that I've never met happened to mention to Alex Ferguson that I enjoyed watching United and that I was very ill. Without a thought he wrote out a get well note and the note stayed attatched to my bed during my stay in intensive care!
A small gesture perhaps but it meant a lot to me, and my familly.

 

[PaulB]

Last year I was at deaths door for a few weeks.
I'm an Evertonian but I like to watch any team that can put on a good display of football.
When I was at my lowest ebb a guy that I've never met happened to mention to Alex Ferguson that I enjoyed watching United and that I was very ill. Without a thought he wrote out a get well note and the note stayed attatched to my bed during my stay in intensive care!
A small gesture perhaps but it meant a lot to me, and my familly.

Did I mention that despite being a solid red all my life, when I was suffering from a major brain injury and the charge nurse asked me if I was a red or a blue, I told him I was a blue!!! I was convinced I was and couldn't name my youngest child or my own brother and didn't know who my father was despite all of them being around my ICU bed!

And in 1997, me and my family were waiting on a connection flight from Heathrow to Manchester and ahead of us in the queue were the Man Utd team (who I have a mild disrespect for). We were coming back from New England and they were coming back from South Africa. We were mingling with them in the BA lounge and they were all amenable and nice people. I got on well with Brian Robson and Dion Dublin and my wife sat next to Alex Ferguson and his wife on the flight back. They were kindness itself to her despite her being as Liverpudlian as me.

 

[chap]

...would you be impressed or completely underwhelmed?

I would love to meet a 'soccer' manger: I would do the following:

1. Teach him to tie a half-windsor knot: why are we deluged with all these football managers and fanciful 'entrepreneurs' donning full, if not double, windsors? It's a tie, not a bow-tie!
2. Enrol him in an oration class: the monotonous voice and canned phrases really are undeserving of the public, let alone television.
3. Encourage him to issue an age limit for his team's football strips: I think 15 is more than generous, after that one really ought to look elsewhere for sartorial inspiration.

 

[Slowgrind]

I was in Whiston ICU. PaulB!
Can you imagine the remarks and comments that anything UTD. would receive?

 

[Funtboy]

...would you be impressed or completely underwhelmed?

These, for those who don't follow cheese-rolling, are alpha males who chew gum and swear a lot, so they must think themselves Very Important Men. However since I don't have the slightest jot of interest in soccer and am completely unimpressed by the overgrown children who inhabit that world I think it would be curious to be in the same room as one of them for a few minutes. Firstly I probably wouldn't know who he was and even if he was one of the two I might recognise (but be unable to name) I would probably start a conversation about the weather and how late everything is this year. If the conversation did turn to cheese rolling I would not be able to join in because I know so little about it.

Have you ever met somebody who inhabited a completely different world to yourself? What did you talk about?

Love it when cyclist get sniffy about football.

You are immensely cool. Never forget that...