The Press and Journal (Aberdeen and Aberdeenshire)
No easy way to say goodbye
Former Dons and Ross County manager Alex Smith delivers his verdict on the week in football
Jose Mourinho has a reputation for being a ruthless manager, but his handling of Wayne Rooney at Manchester United has been outstanding.
The England international yesterday announced he would be staying at Old Trafford despite intense speculation he was bound for China, not helped by the fact his agent is in the country negotiating a move for a player who has found himself not part of his manager’s plans.
The announcement delays the inevitable as moving the England captain out of the club has been a situation which has required careful and sensitive handling.
It has been done brilliantly. Rooney is the captain of his club, an outstanding servant and a man who become the leading goalscorer in United’s history this season.
The only problem is his powers are on the wane.
There’s no shame in that as it happens to every player, but the result has been Rooney slipping down the pecking order at Old Trafford behind Zlatan Ibrahimovic, Anthony Martial and Marcus Rashford.
It is not an uncommon situation, but left Mourinho with a very expensive substitute.
That’s why the ball has been rolling on this for a while with the United manager announcing he would use Rooney as a number nine and nothing else. In doing that he let the player and the supporters know there would be no midfield role.
Rooney has given United the best years of his career. It is why he is deserving of the same treatment in return from his club and I’m pleased to see the proper respect being shown.
I’ve had to deal with
“Tactics are all well and good, but players know how to play the game”
club captains being out of the team a few times in my career and one sticks in my mind. At Aberdeen I had to help manage the end of the career of arguably the club’s greatest player, Willie Miller.
It was doubly difficult as Willie was a superb player and one who was willing to put his body on the line for the club, despite suffering from a serious knee injury which he had picked up while playing for Scotland against Norway in November 1989.
It was his 65th and final game for Scotland and ultimately proved the end of his glorious career. He returned to the Dons team in March but suffered a relapse from which he didn’t recover.
It was horrible as we had reached the Scottish Cup final and Willie was doing all he could to get himself fit for the game and the pressure on me to play him was enormous. He was our captain.
I went with the team that won the semi-final, but Willie was very professional about the whole thing and he kept it on a level that was becoming of him. I expected nothing less.
We both knew it was the end for him as I couldn’t watch Willie put himself through any more.
I remember being told Willie was playing through the pain of two bones rubbing together. This was prior to the injury he suffered playing for his country and I recall him not training through the week, hobbling through one session on a Friday then putting in a man of the match performance on Saturday.
To this day I don’t know how he did it. We couldn’t let it go on, but it was crucial we let the man call time on his career in a dignified manner and he did just that.
Man management is perhaps the greatest skill required of a manager.
Tactics are all well and good, but players know how to play the game. It’s keeping them focused, getting the best out of them and doing what’s best for the team that separates the good managers from the truly great ones.
Tcount.
In one corner Neil Lennon, a man who has been involved in the heat of Old Firm competition as a player and manager with a squad of players who also know all about what is required in an Edinburgh derby.
In the other Ian Cathro, a newcomer with a new-look squad of players, the majority of who had only played in the fixture once. That’s why the outcome of Wednesday’s Scottish Cup replay came as no surprise to me.
On Saturday Hibs went to Kirkcaldy and Lennon endured a poor performance from his players against Raith Rovers.
He lambasted them in the dressing room then gave them a public rollicking, knowing his squad was going into the big derby on Wednesday. Because they had been rattled privately and publicly his players came out with a point to prove.
The right attitude is what Lennon wanted and that is what he got against the Jambos. Great management and a calculated risk on his part.
Hearts, playing in front of a hostile crowd, didn’t get going at Easter Road. They weren’t allowed to. It’s why one man was left celebrating and the other questioning where it all went wrong.
Wednesday reinforced my belief we need to expand our top flight in Scotland. I’ve been asking for a long time why are we continuing to have big clubs out of our league when the game needs derby matches. In other words, a 16-team division.
It’s a no-brainer. There is nothing between the leading Championship clubs and the bottom half of the Premiership, but the powers that be continue to look short term.
They will wake up one day. When they are skint.