by bigmick » Tue Feb 10, 2009 11:33 am
Owzat's posts earlier are brilliant IMHo and I enjoyed reading them. Once he picks you up on the stats, you are best just conceding straight away as he leaves you nowhere to go. It's just logic upon logic and I enjoyed reading that. He rarely picks me up, because I don't do many stats on account of the fact I absolutely always feck em up. Anyway, good stuff.
All that said, I think anyone who thinks that we have gotten a fair press under Rafa is deluded. The press positively bay for a reaosn to get into us, and although some of our fans are admittedly a tinsy wincy bit blinkered, they are right on this. The contrast between the reporting we get in all forms of the media and what the Mancs get, is so obvious it is embarassing. Chelsea too used to get great press under Mourinho, and I'd like to accept that as a given ( because to me it's absolutely beyond dispute) and ask why it is?
I think at its heart, there is xenophobia and racism, allied to some protectionism. I say that while fully admitting I've let my subscriptions to the "Rafa is God" club fall into deficit (I'm getting red ink demand letters now), I'm simply calling it how it is. But how can it be, how can it be even slightly possible that non-British managers such as Mourinho get a better press than other non-British managers like Benitez?
Here's how: Firstly Mourinho is good press. Always ready with a soundbite, an interview, a front page quote if you stand still with a microphone long enough. I'm not holding this up as a virtue of a manager I have lots of respect for, I am simply telling it as it is. I am not in the least, not even 1% criticising Rafa for not being like that, I am simply telling it as I see it. "Parking the bus" was Mourinho, and it's funny. It's funny because it encapsulates quite a complicated concept in three words. When Ferguson talked about the money at Chelsea's disposal, Mourinho fired back quick smart that of course money wasn't everything, Porto had nowhere near the money that Man Utd had but they'd still managed to beat them in the Champions League etc etc. All the "special one" stuff the press loved. It was b0ll0cks of course, but the press loved it because it sold papers, column inches and advertizing slots on SKY. Who was this fecker who was so sure of himself? That he came along and single handedly broke up the Status Quo of Arsenal and Man Utd was even better, a breath of fresh air.
It went deeper than that though. Mourinho gained the respect of his peers, he appeared to respect the fabric of the game in England. He went out of his way on every occasion to talk of the English League being the best in the World, he talked about other managers in glowing terms, high fived them after Chelsea had won, said his team had been "lucky" on occasions and talked of some of the English players he managed as being the best players in the World. The press loved all that, as did his players, and as did the other managers as well. His charisma won everyone within the game over, and as a result Chelsea got excellent press.
If you compare that to the treatment Scholari got, or Avram Grant, you see a marked contrast. In both cases my opinion is that they are excellent managers, and thoroughly decent men as well. Arguably, they are more thoroughly decent than Mourinho, but for the press there wasn't the same empathy, the same connection.
And Rafa is far more Scholari than Mourinho. You could see by the way the two embraced before we played Chelsea that there is mutual respect, two top coaches showing their mutual regard for each other. Mourinho talked about Rafa being "his friend" in the early days, but in actual fact there was no love lost. But here's even more to it than that. It's not just that Rafa isn't as press friendly as Mourinho, it goes deeper.
In Rafa, the press see an affront to English football. Not only is the methodology alien to what has been practiced over the previous 100 years, not only is there seemingly no attempt to doff the cap in the direction of tradition, but there is also at times a willingness to cast doubt on the fabric of our game. The press don't like that, and my guess is that football fans in general don't either.
So what do I mean? Well obviously the mass rotation from game one is a new idea over in England, yet to be successful. Not only though does Rafa practice it, he does it with an "I know best and you lot are feckwits" air of certainty. The professional game is being asked to accept that over all these years they have been doing it wrong, and it's a bitter pill to swallow. They want proof (as do we all come to that). Not only that, but Rafa has an uneasy relationship with the press, a reluctance to explain how he is thinking. Telling the press that Torres can't play against teams which defend deep may convince some, but anyone with any idea whatsoever of the game would know this was utter nonsense. The press in the most part do have some sort of isea and deserve better. And lastly, Rafa has in the past rounded upon certain figures who are stalwarts of the game in England, and complained about smaller teams tacitcs too much. I remember Houlliers "we knew he was a bad manager" line about Neil Warnock for instance and Raf has done too much of that . Now Neil Warnock might be the biggest c... walking the face of the earth, but he isn't a bad manager far from it. he has performed miracles at various league and non league clubs over the years. Anyone who doesn't belive me me should check his record, read what other players have said about him. You don't IMHO come into English football and slag off someone like that (who once again the press love) if you want to get a decent hearing. The British love an underdog, and they like people to behave with humility. At times we haven't done that.
It's no surprise if you read his book (and you should it's a good read) that warnock loves Ferguson. Always treated him wiht the utmost respect you see. My guess is that the world and his brother would rather see Man Utd win the title than us. Many will say feck em. Many will say that Rafa deserves more respect because he refuses to pander to the media. They may all be right, I'm simply as an Englishman trying to give a reason for things being the way they are.
Last edited by
bigmick on Tue Feb 10, 2009 11:39 am, edited 1 time in total.
"se e in una bottigla ed e bianco, e latte".
by