England

[midds]

It was Andorra for christ sake, and we played poorly. So I fail to understand why so many people say this shows why we should drop Lampard or why Gerrard is suddenly the great saviour. Get a grip of yourselves.

 

Surely if you're playing poorly against Andorra it is a sign that you have not found any sort of winning formula.

 

We were playing against a bunch of part-time footballers today. Andorra man! How anyone can draw conclusions about tactics and team selections from a performance like this I don't know. Let's judge the likes of Lampard and Gerrard in the big games where we will really need them. For me both of them have been a disappointment for a long time but I feel Lampard turns up more often for the big games against big opposition.

 

Obviously it was only Andorra, but I didn't see anyone else grab the game with the scruff like Gerrard did.

 

Lampard turns up more often for big games? Utter shit tbh pal. World Cup, Lampard has most shots in the tournament, no goals. Gerrard scores 2. Champions League final, Gerrard pretty much wins it on his own. Whens Lampard ever done anything like that?

 

Agreed. But the fucker was lucky to even be still on the field tbh. Fucking horrible 'tackle'. 

[Guest alex]

It was Andorra for christ sake, and we played poorly. So I fail to understand why so many people say this shows why we should drop Lampard or why Gerrard is suddenly the great saviour. Get a grip of yourselves.

 

Surely if you're playing poorly against Andorra it is a sign that you have not found any sort of winning formula.

 

We were playing against a bunch of part-time footballers today. Andorra man! How anyone can draw conclusions about tactics and team selections from a performance like this I don't know. Let's judge the likes of Lampard and Gerrard in the big games where we will really need them. For me both of them have been a disappointment for a long time but I feel Lampard turns up more often for the big games against big opposition.

 

Obviously it was only Andorra, but I didn't see anyone else grab the game with the scruff like Gerrard did.

 

Lampard turns up more often for big games? Utter shit tbh pal. World Cup, Lampard has most shots in the tournament, no goals. Gerrard scores 2. Champions League final, Gerrard pretty much wins it on his own. Whens Lampard ever done anything like that?

 

Agreed. But the fucker was lucky to even be still on the field tbh. Fucking horrible 'tackle'. 

True like. Over the top, knew exactly what he was doing. Blatant dive too.

[Ally]

Excellent article on F365, agree with it all. McClaren might not be a good enough manager, but theres no need for 'McClaren is a wanker' being sung during the game. I thought we'd taken the passports off all the knobheads who go to England games?

 

As I watched the game from the bar of the Holiday Inn hotel outside of Bristol Airport - £109 a night and the stench of pig sh*t thrown in for free - I felt nothing but sorrow and sympathy. Not for the fans, not for the players, but for Steve McClaren.

 

I have publicly stated there is something deeply annoying about him and he has a face you'd really like to slap, and I only said it half in jest. As a Boro fan I was always aware he wasn't capable of doing the job, but nonetheless, to berate him so viciously and so personally as fans did last night was verging on the psychotic.

 

Let's just say this plainly. It's wrong.

 

To direct so much abuse at one man, even a gingery freckled man, is simply disproportionate. He hasn't broken in your house, screwed your daughter and taken a sh*t on your floor. Just remember that he was invited to take the job, the real honour of managing his nation's football team, and is paid handsomely for doing so. If you want to have a go at anyone, it's the FA who should be at the dirty end of the stick.

 

McClaren may well be out of his depth but he's not deliberately being awful. Actually, he's probably doing the best he can. Yes, it's not good enough, but he was asked to do this. He's doing what he can. By all means be critical; we all are, but the personal vilification of him as a man is, at least to me, psychologically disturbed.

 

It's not as though Steve has personally debased a set of high-achieving players. He's not corrupted something that was pure and wonderful.

 

Are the fans berating him the ones who bought the golden generation idea? The very idea sold to them by an anti-Sven press who wanted him out and an Englishman in? Think on and work that one out.

 

At the very least, the visceral berating of McClaren is confused. Even if he isn't a great man-manager or motivator, he still has to manage a team of average talent. Don't forget, most journalists have to keep players sweet so they can get stories. It's much easier for the papers to slaughter the manager but ultimately, it's not the manager to blame, it is the players. He can't make them control the ball well or pass it accurately. No international manager can do that.

 

Does anyone really think that booing the team after ten minutes will somehow give them confidence to play well? Clearly, they are playing with fear and inhibition just as they did at the World Cup. They play scared because they fear the very reaction we saw writ large on Wednesday. Our unreasonable glorification of them at club level and the even more unreasonable international expectations of their talents is one of the root causes of the last 40 years of mediocrity and failure. The pressure is unbearable for all concerned.

 

Sod the money, the egos and the tactics, at the end of all of that they're just f***ing humans with actual emotions. I know in part their role as glamorous rich kids is to be our whipping boys as we grind out a daily existence, fair enough, but there's got to be some balance. Yes it's bloody annoying that they play poorly but they're not evil. To excoriate McClaren as though he's done something really bad, as though he's a kind of war criminal, is plain wrong. More than that, it's mentally ill. You could see the sickness in the eyes of the fans that were abusing him. That's not normal. Get some lithium or Prozac please.

 

Anyone with an ounce of humanity would have felt sorry for him last night. You could see the ugly, vile side of humanity. You could see how lynchings happen. I felt at one point that if they could have, they may well have killed him.

 

I don't blame him for not doing the press conference either. To sit in front of a group of people who in essence want to say "just admit you're crap Steve" or "you're a bit of a wanker aren't you...why don't you just f*ck off?" is not something you or I would ever have tolerate or even be in a position to have to endure. Nobody should have to. Not even England's manager. It's inhuman and glories in the base side of human nature.

 

His position may be untenable - though don't expect any other manager to achieve much more - but we should never forget he is just a bloke like you and me, and he deserves to be treated like a sentient creature, not a piece of meat to abuse for your own sadistic pleasure.

 

The anti-anti-McClaren backlash starts here.

[DubblyDubblyDubbly]

And Max Clifford puts the final nail in the coffin...

http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/football/6506599.stm

It is hard to believe it's only eight months since Steve McClaren gave a smiling, confident performance in his first news conference as England coach.

 

The former Middlesbrough manager seemed to relish being in the media spotlight as he announced his squad to face Greece in August.

 

He was unrecognisable from the shattered and emotional man who addressed the press in the bowels of Barcelona's Olympic Stadium after Wednesday's 3-0 win over Andorra.

 

"Gentlemen, you can write whatever you want to write, because that's all I'm going to say," McClaren said, before storming out less than two minutes into his news conference.

 

How have McClaren's relations with the press deteriorated so quickly? And can they be patched up now?

 

PR guru Max Clifford, who worked with the England coach for three months before severing ties in December, gives his expert views.

 

 

QUESTION: DO PUBLIC RELATIONS MATTER?

Everyone knows the England manager lives or dies by results, but PR has a big effect.

 

Steve has been in a vicious circle. Bad press coverage has influenced the fans, that has put pressure on him and in turn performances have been inhibited further.

 

Look at Wednesday's game as an example - the England supporters had been stoked up by the papers and were booing Steve from almost the start.

 

If the media turn on you, it's added pressure. That's why political parties, the Royals, film stars, you name it, all rely on PR. I explained to Steve at the start that Middlesbrough is one thing, the England job is another.

 

It's second only to the job of Prime Minister in terms of media pressure and you need as much protection as possible. Sadly he hasn't had that.

 

 

 

Q: WHY HAVE THE PRESS TURNED ON McCLAREN?

The obvious reason is that things haven't gone well in terms of the team and its performance for a few months.

 

But you can still make the best of a bad situation through PR. Instead, the way things have been handled by the Football Association has made the worst of a bad situation.

 

You make the best of things by building good relationships with journalists. Then they will want you to succeed because you are good for them. Sports journalists have to get results as well.

 

The press will be looking to be as sympathetic as they can because it's in their interests to do that.

 

If Steve McClaren gives you contact and that's part of your success, then you will think twice before you stitch him up.

 

It's not rocket science, but the FA don't realise it. If he had a better relationship with the media, they would be more understanding and attack the players more than Steve.

 

 

 

Q: WHAT WOULD YOU HAVE DONE?

I wanted to arrange for Steve to have dinner with the sports editors on all the national newspapers and I would have fed journalists little tit-bits of information all the time. I would have said 'this is for you, this is for you'.

 

 

Venables writes a weekly newspaper column

That would have enabled us to build up some close relationships.

 

For example, I worked with Mohammed Al Fayed and we built good relationships with journalists. It meant he got the best press he's ever had and when Fulham were promoted, six national newspaper editors attended the party at Harrods.

 

Another thing I insisted on when I worked with Steve was that his assistant, Terry Venables, stop doing his column for the News of the World.

 

You must not allow favourites, otherwise it rubs people up the wrong way. But he has been allowed to carry on with it.

 

The secret is to develop relationships, then you can influence things far more than by simply blocking the press, which is what has happened.

 

 

 

Q: WHY DID YOU SEVER TIES WITH McCLAREN?

It was a waste of time, because I wasn't allowed to do what I wanted to do. To use a football analogy, I want to be in the centre of midfield, influencing things, yet I wasn't even on the subs bench.

 

I'm not the type of person who will just take the money and not do anything. It's a shame, because it would have been a wonderful chance.

 

The FA doesn't understand the press, they think it's 'them and us' and have a siege mentality.

 

Steve should have been stronger and insisted on continuing to work with me.

 

 

 

Q: CAN THINGS BE IMPROVED?

I really think it's too late in the game now. You need to begin your PR strategy at the start of the game and not halfway through the second half.

 

Steve is under siege and has not built the relationships he needs to with sports journalists and editors. They have nothing to lose by criticising him and a lot of the things that have happened have been understandable.

 

One thing he can do is to be open, honest and sincere. At the moment, his interviews and press conferences seem very contrived.

 

Steve looked like a condemned prisoner going to his cell at the press conference after the game on Wednesday. Earlier in the week he said Saturday's performance had been good, and that made him lose credibility.

 

The press and the public would have more respect and sympathy for him if he was genuine. He is coming across more and more defensive and looks so anxious when he's in front of the press.

 

But the answer was to build relationships at the start.

 

I haven't heard a word from Steve, other than a text he sent me to wish me a happy Christmas. I wish him well but we couldn't work together again because I know it can't work.