TCIB
Well-Known Member
Argh why do people keep doing this.
If the article is shit copy and paste it, just linking it does their job for them generating hits for bullshit. Here is the full article...
‘You can bet your boots,’ he would say, ‘that when we go into the market we identify lads who can play the game, can kick the ball in the right direction, are a bit special.
‘But then we ask how much they want to win.’
That question has changed slightly in wording, massively in meaning.
The abbreviated inquiry made by today’s Premier League managers of players like Raheem Sterling is this: ‘How much do you want?’
Would Fergie have bought Raheem Sterling?
My suspicion is that he would not. Certainly not for £49million. Maybe not for 49 pence.
When the Laird of Old Trafford broke transfer records it was not for spoiled boys of uncertain commitment, febrile laddies who might feel too tired to play 90 minutes of football.
It was for men of ‘character.’
Men like Bryan Robson, otherwise Captain Marvel and like Roy Keane, despite the fiery personal relationship between player and manager.
When Sir Alex picked his teams he chose do-or-die winners. Real men like Mark Hughes and Steve Bruce.
When he went for flair, it came laced with the unfailing ambition of men like Ryan Giggs, Eric Cantona, Paul Scholes.
Of his more recent acquisitions, Wayne Rooney continues to confound his detractors as he closes on the great Sir Bobby Charlton’s goal-scoring records for England and United, picking up medals along the way.
Of course not all Ferguson’s signings were successful. No-one is infallible. But his record speaks for the will-to-win of most of those buys.
The same was true of the other great managers of English football’s golden age.
Bill Shankly built and rebuilt the Liverpool legend on the likes of Ron Yeats, Tommy Smith, Roger Hunt, Chris Lawler, Ian St John, Kevin Keegan, Emlyn Hughes.
Don Revie hauled Leeds United out of the doldrums by the boot laces of Billy Bremner, Johnny Giles, Jack Charlton, Mick Jones, Allan Clarke, Norman Hunter.
Every one a winner, by nature. Every one put football first, fortune second.
So what was the first thing Master Sterling had to say when Manchester City gave Liverpool nigh-on £50m for the questionable privilege of paying him £180,000 a week?
He thanked his agent for setting up the deal.
There were a few hurried afterthoughts about how nice it will be to play at the Etihad, a disingenuous footnote about how Liverpool weren’t so bad, after all.
Mostly, though, it was about the money.
An awful lot of money for a lad who is not a winner. Not by any proper usage of the word.
Liverpool have won precisely nothing with Sterling in their team. He averages less than a goal every five games.
Despite the fanfare which greeted his arrival at the 2014 World Cup finals and a lively first game in defeat by Italy, he faded badly in the two ensuing matches in Brazil, as England came home early and humiliated.
Liverpool manager Brendan Rodgers could have been excused for joining the accusations of disloyalty as Sterling insisted on aborting his contract at the great club which gave him his chance.
Instead, he said there were no hard feelings.
Rodgers has got that one right, assuming he spends that excessive transfer fee on something better.
That should not prove too difficult even though Sterling has been called – carelessly and unwisely - the best young footballer in Europe.
Potential is no guarantee of fulfilment and wiser heads within the game know it.
Arsene Wenger said no, he had not tried to hi-jack City’s signing of Sterling for Arsenal. He added: ‘We have players like him.’
Theo Walcott to name but one, who unlike Sterling has not been spotted inhaling dubious substances in undesirable places.
Good luck to Manuel Pellegrini - having survived narrowly at City despite losing the league title to Chelsea and flopping in Europe – if this example of Sterling turns out to be counterfeit.
If so this would not be the first case of a young footballer given too much reward before minimal achievement, only to wilt as prematurely as a daisy in a desert.
‘Character,’ as Fergie says. ‘You canna buy it.’
Except that he did.
In football, it seems nothing succeeds like failure.
Fabio Capello has just been sacked as manager of Russia after failing to win a World Cup game at Brazil 2014, then winning only two of their six Euro 2016 qualifiers so far.
For this, after banking more than £6m a year for three years, he picks up a £10.7m pay-off.
That follows reported earnings of £6m a year for four years as manager of England, ended by a £1.5m pay-off for winning... precisely nothing.
Nice work if you can get it no matter how well or badly you do it: Roughly £60m for seven years of failure.
Why, he could buy Sterling and still have more than £10m left over.
Not that our Fabio will do that.
A failure he may be now. But he’s not as daft as the English and Russian Football Associations.
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