Opportunity Knox for Gerrard to beat Archie’s history makers
ARCHIE KNOX is unashamedly old school, which is why he’s pleasantly surprised to find Rangers manager Steven Gerrard a fellow student.
The former Ibrox assistant manager to Walter Smith describes himself as a ‘dinosaur’ as if it’s a bad thing.
After all, he is among the best No 2s in British football history. Sir Alex Ferguson, Smith and a few world-class players would certainly agree.
Knox had 15 different jobs as either coach or assistant, including two stints with the national team, but he’s perhaps best known for his years at Rangers, which brings the conversation with him to Gerrard and the job he has done at Ibrox so far.
It’s fair to say Knox is impressed with what he has seen and also what he’s heard about the still new Rangers manager (inset).
Knox said: “I know he doesn’t have managerial experience, but he has so much football experience. He captained Liverpool, won over 100 caps for England and captained them as well, so I do think everyone will have been in awe of him.
“His approach to management will be the same as he approached playing. He will do it the same way. There will be sports science and all that stuff but with him I think it’s the old brigade kicking in at Rangers.
“You go to training, you get on with training and if you don’t work at the level which is needed then you won’t get a game. I have seen that within Gerrard so far. It comes through loud and clear that he’s that way inclined.
“Plus, the fact if you don’t perform – and the lad [Nikola] Katic didn’t have his best game at Hamilton – you’ll get taken off. He knows how to deal with players and while he gives off a calmness, when the goals are scored he is really up for it. He has that passion.” Should Rangers avoid defeat against Spartak Moscow on Thursday they will go 11 games without defeat in Europe. Gerrard’s side and the one Smith and Knox led almost to the Champions League final in 1993 sit on 10 in a row – which is what the English football legend is here to stop in a domestic sense.
Knox said: “He knew that right from the word go. It was the same at Liverpool, it’s the same at Celtic. You have to win.”
Knox still has friends at Ibrox and word has reached him that Gerrard is the type to take an interest in his young players, something this club has been crying out for.
Knox said: “In the English Premier League, and maybe to an extent up here, the manager is all about the first team. In older days, Alex, Walter and Jim McLean watched the youth games. A lot of that doesn’t happen now but I know for a fact that Gerrard is interested in what is coming through, what is happening at the academy and he’s been taking some of these lads into the first team training.
“Maybe this is because he saw how it worked at Liverpool and, of course, this is how he got his chance. If a kid shows their worth then they will get a chance. It’s all you can ask for.”
Knox, now 71, is tough as teak – or should that be Tealing, the Angus village he comes from – but you could tell this football man was genuinely touched by the honour of being inducted into Scottish Football’s Hall of Fame on Sunday night. “When Alex got his OBE, I asked him if he knew what it stood for. He said: “Aye, it’s the Order of the British Empire.’ I told him: ‘Naw, it’s for Other Buggers’ Efforts.”
Knox’s playing record by his own admission was modest. Forfar Atheltic is where he spent the best days of a career which also saw him play for St Mirren, Dundee United and Montrose.
I count 17 trophies with Ferguson’s Aberdeen and Manchester United, the two moved south as a package, and then at Rangers as Smith’s righthand man during the nine-ina-row era.
Paul Gascoigne, Ally McCoist, Bryan Robson, Paul Ince, Gordon Strachan and Mark McGhee, who Knox worked with at Aberdeen which was his last job in football, fall over themselves to talk of just how good Knox was as a coach.
“It’s an unbelievable honour, just fantastic,” Knox admitted.
“It’s up there with anything I have achieved, especially as I haven’t done anything for quite some time now and you look at the people in there with hundreds of caps and having done everything in football. It’s great.”
“When I go to coaching courses I’m asked what an assistant manger does. I tell them the clue is in the name. You help the manager. That’s what you’re there for.
“You will have your disagreements, as I did with all of them, but if there is a change you don’t agree with, you accept it and get on with it. I never had a problem with that.”