Time waits for no manager
The sacking of Jose Mourinho underlines how hard it is for managers to stay a long time at one club. Matt Dickinson reports.
WHAT is the key to managerial longevity? To the longlasting excellence that kept a man such as Sir Alex Ferguson going into his 70s? This seems the week to ponder.
The more that Manchester United lurch around, and we see the waning of the sacked Jose Mourinho’s powers, the more we marvel afresh at Ferguson’s brilliance; how he kept rebuilding and still winning at 71 with players running through walls for him. We call it longevity, except that word does not do him justice – making it sound like a slog of endurance when it depended on staying fresh, vital, energetic and optimistic every day into pensionable age.
Inspirational captain Roy Keane fell out irreparably with Ferguson, but he still came closest to capturing his former manager’s core ability, and staying power, which was nothing to do with strategy or spotting a player. It was, Keane recognised, knowing exactly what to say to a dressing room of footballers every single day for 26 years – smelling the mood, instinctively sensing what to say, and how to say it.
It was understanding what makes humans tick. It was a love of being around players and staff; leading them, cajoling, inspiring and teaching them. And, yes, occasionally ruthlessly moving some on.
How some have this ability to stay full of zest, and others not, intrigues when we see the diminishing returns of Mourinho, one of the most successful managers of all time. At 55, he says he is not finished – ‘‘I have a future without United,’’ he said while strolling from his home in central London this week – and presumably he expects to add to the 20 leading trophies that he has already won at five clubs.
But first, surely, he has to rediscover a love of being around footballers because no one saw it in Manchester any time recently. Whatever pleasure he had from the training ground had long soured. And how can anyone expect to be successful if they no longer enjoy going to work?
I was mulling this, too, while watching the excellent documentary about Sir Bobby Robson, More Than A Manager (Netflix), struck once more with awe at Robson’s ability to come through any crisis or undeserved indignity still in love with the game, with his job and with life. Tactics are not dwelt upon, but we are left in no doubt at all about why a footballer would love to play for Robson through almost four decades until he was dumped by Newcastle United at 71.
A lunch on Tyneside remains one of the most cherished treats in this job – I can still see Robson dancing around the restaurant to re-enact Diego Maradona’s second goal against England in 1986 – and if some of the youngsters at Newcastle had started to take liberties, then more fool them for not understanding how lucky they were.
‘‘Under Sir Bobby, I knew I was safe,’’ an emotional England star Paul Gascoigne says of Robson’s immense humanity. He was a father-figure – occasionally irascible but forgiving, wanting to see the best in people – as much as a football coach.
Mourinho got to observe that infectious positivity up close for many years – at Robson’s side as an assistant coach through so much, as the film reminds us — which only emphasises how easily he, in contrast, is drawn to rancour and passing the blame. Mourinho can say that he has won many more trophies than Robson, but we may wonder what he has lost along the way.
Will he rediscover his own enthusiasm? Can he ever learn to love the job even if he is not winning? Will he go on or, indeed, will any of today’s top managers continue into their 60s and 70s?
Not like Ferguson at one club. With the relentlessly harsh media scrutiny, and impatient judgment from fans and owners, none are likely to survive significant downturns like the Scot, nor even try to. ‘‘Ferguson will leave Old Trafford with everything to his name apart from a happy ending,’’ as one fool wrote in December, 2005. In my defence, I was far from alone.
The club never gave up on him because the players never did. Unlike Arsenal icon Arsene Wenger, Ferguson managed to refresh himself by regularly changing assistants and maintained a curiosity about evolving sports science and tactics – or, at least, found someone very capable to do it for him – but what really kept him going was the respect from those he needed to perform.
Jurgen Klopp has that at Liverpool, only his third club in 17 years as a coach because of the way he loves to build close connections. Speak to anyone around Anfield and it is the powerful, bold charisma that they most love about him. It seems hard to imagine his passion ever waning, but then he is only 51.
Pep Guardiola? Will he still be striving to create the perfect Manchester City team 20 years from now? ‘‘The day I see the light go out of my players’ eyes, I’ll know it’s time to go,’’ he once said of the way he moves clubs by his own volition before there is a chance for relations to sour, or he burns out. ‘‘You look into your players’ eyes and it’s a bit like looking at a lover,’’ he added. ‘‘Either you see passion and a willingness to be seduced, or you watch as the passion ebbs away.’’
He cannot thrive unless players are hanging off every word, sharing his intensity, but there is no sign of that chemistry waning yet.
The world knows that Mourinho has had that effect. ‘‘It’s a presence and an aura and a way with people,’’ ex-Chelsea midfielder Frank Lampard once explained. ‘‘He galvanises people. We’ve all got confidence that is up and down. Mourinho was the best. He brought my confidence to a level it had never been.’’
Dozens of players would say the same, certainly through to that treble at Inter Milan in 2010. Perhaps you recall the revealing footage of Mourinho driving out of the Bernabeu after the crowning glory of the Champions League final, stopping the car to give a farewell embrace to Marco Materazzi, which quickly became heaving sobs from both men.
‘‘I lost a friend — he made me feel important, something not everyone did,’’ the Italy and Real Madrid defender said of his departing leader and those shared tears. The contrast to now, with barely a trickle of goodbye messages coming out from United players, is stark. Mourinho loves to tell us the game is all about trophies, but he seems to have forgotten it is about winning over people, first and foremost.
‘‘The day I see the light go out of my players’ eyes, I’ll know it’s time to go.’’ Manchester City manager Pep Guardiola
THE TIMES, LONDON