Managing Expectations

by Rick Nash

That was the week that was...

• In Spain, about two-thirds of Real Madrid's members believe that Jose Mourinho is damaging the club. Rivals Barcelona continue to dominate La Liga, this weekend winning the Basque derby in impressive style (4-0 over Espanyol).
• Closer to home, Paul Lambert's time at Villa sunk to a new low with a humiliating semi-final, 1st leg defeat to Bradford in the Capital One Cup.
• Swansea continued to bring Rafa Benitez back down to earth by humbling Chelsea 2-0 - at Stamford Bridge - in the other semi. 
• Meanwhile, in the FA Cup, Newcastle were the highest profile Premier League side upset (by Brighton) in the weekend's opening tie.

Perhaps the one stellar point raised in last week's column (which was otherwise disastrous, picks-wise, with 5-upset bets yielding a grand total of €0) is that this is the year when the 'super manager' actually wouldn't be able to swoop in and save a struggling club. The expected turnaround that Harry Redknapp would bring at QPR appears to have fallen short. Martin O'Neill, previously hailed as THE 'super manager' for a struggling club, isn't having things all his own way at Sunderland. The managers mentioned in the above bullet points all continue to unceremoniously blunder, despite their considerable reputations.

We think that bringing in a big name boss who has done wonders at another club will turn around fortunes when a club is struggling, but in 2012/13, is that still the case?

Look at the two shining examples of positivity mentioned above, for example: Barcelona and Swansea. Question marks lay over the heads of both of their new bosses as they took up their new posts this season, both needing to fill big shoes. And yet both Tito Villanova and Michael Laudrup continue to thrive (granted, on different scales, taking into account the respective expectations for both clubs).

A quick look in the other direction at Laudrup's predecessor and a very different picture emerges. While Brendan Rogers is finally starting to bring some semblance of style and balance to Anfield, their pattern of results remains inconsistent at best. Convincing wins over Fulham, QPR and Sunderland have been scattered amid poor losses away at Stoke (forgiveable) and at home to Aston Villa (not so much...). They were one 'Hand of Satan Suarez' goal away from being forced into an FA Cup Replay with Mansfield and currently lie just two points above Swansea in the table. When you consider that critics predicted a new dawn at Liverpool and a relegation-threatened season in Wales when Rogers left one for the other...in actuality, things haven't exactly panned out that way...

Both Real Madrid and Newcastle are perfect examples of managerial ineffectiveness. Both Jose Mourinho and Alan Pardew were kings last season. With little to no departures, both have seen their fortunes change dramatically this year. Even the internal strife (Cristiano Ronaldo's sadness and Demba Ba being unsettled) seemed to come off the back of poor results rather than directly cause them (both remained their respective clubs' top scorers until Ba departed for Chelsea). It's easy to want someone to blame, to call for change, and the manager is obviously the easiest target. But that is to forget - as fans so often do when the good times end - that both Mourinho and Pardew were the change. And it was successful. Now it's just...not. And what has changed? Aside from Ba's departure (which has happened too soon to be able to gauge any meaningful conclusions from)...not much, in either club's case.

So why did they succeed at all to begin with? Well that's easy: having the likes of Cristiano Ronaldo and Sergio Ramos will mean that you can beat any team on the planet on any given day. An attacking combination like Hatem Ben Arfa and Demba Ba statistically has to cause problems. But when that winning combination is broken and doesn't look like getting fixed, without any kind of massive overhaul that would cause such a change, perhaps it leaves a manager who was previously coasting on great talent alone with their pants down.

What has worked for Barcelona and Swansea, then? Were they merely both lucky to get the right man at the right time? 

Maintaining a tremendous head of hair can only account for so much managerial success, after all...

You might say that...if you didn't watch them play. But a quick look at their on-field form tells you that the exact same thing that worked for them under the old boss works under the new one too. At the heart of their success lies the combination of a solid system and players that understand their role within it. From what we can see, essentially all the managers have done is maintain the status quo and added their own slight tweaks (Barcelona have learned not to panic when they fall behind and play to the 90th minute now; while Swansea have improved by adding an attacking intent to their stylish passing game).

That's not to say that a manager is ineffective in affecting the fortunes of a football club these days: we've seen many times how the wrong appointment can collapse a side (QPR under Mark Hughes and Blackburn under Steve Kean are two recent examples). But merely that they aren't the be-all, end-all that we make them out to be.

Steve Kean fought the system...and the system won...

In the dayjob, I work with several retail clients. Over the years I've worked with so many that I can figure out if a shop is managed well or badly within a few minutes of being there. The one overwhelmingly positive trait that I've found in a good manager is that they employ a good system, work hard on recruitment to find the right people, train said staff to understand the system and be able to operate it themselves, then let the system run itself and merely delegate and troubleshoot on top of their day-to-day maintenance work. When a problem arises, they are respected and stamp it out immediately. Cross them and you won't last long, but do your job as asked and you'll succeed. The hands-on, neurotic managers who see themselves as the centre of a store's success pretty much always fail, in some way. 

That's what good management is: it isn't overhauling wherever you're managing and leaving a stamp of authority; it's creating a good system and finding the right people to make that system work, then stepping back and letting it run so you can be concerned with the bigger picture, inserting yourself only when needed.

And what is at the heart of both Barcelona and Swansea, on the pitch? A good system! People who know how to make the system work. Thorough recruitment processes to find the right people (token mention of how Michu only cost £2million) and getting rid of people who don't fit into the system quickly, regardless of past achievements (it didn't take long for Ibrahimovic and Henry to be shown the door at Barca; David Villa looks set to follow suit soon).

Arsenal are further proof that this theory works: they still operate the same system they've always had (with a slightly weaker core since they became a high-profile, selling club), brought in the best quality players within their range to run that system, and what do they achieve? The same end results over-and-over again. No, they're not a model of outrageous success, but they're never disastrous either. They are consistently there-or-thereabouts at the end of every season. Frustrating for a fan of theirs, I would imagine, but also better than being Newcastle and in-crisis just months after handing your new, golden boy boss an 8-year contract.

"But wait," you say. "If hands-on management isn't the way to go, is there not one glaring exception to that rule? The one man who appears to live vicariously through his club (he's been there longer than I've been alive) and whose hair-dryer treatment is legendary in footballing circles: Sir Alex Ferguson."

...not really. I mean, what has worked for United as generation after generation have passed and yet success remained?

• A solid system comprising of fearsome pairings at centre-back (Pallister and Bruce; Stam and Johnsen; Rio and Vidic); fast-breaking wide play with creative wingers; and being spoiled for choice with attacking talent.
• A thorough recruitment process to find players who fit into that system. Isn't this year's collection of first-team strikers (RVP, Rooney, super sub Chicharito & Wellbeck) eerily similar that of 1998/99 (Yorke, Cole, super sub Solskjaer & Sheringham)? Granted, he's perhaps OVER-recruited at times - the Djemba-Djemba, Jordi Cruyff and Bebe experiments come to mind - but they've been swiftly dealt with. Speaking of which...
• Quickly and effectively getting rid of anyone who ceased to fit into said system effectively. Messrs Beckham, Keane and van Nistelrooy were all shown the door almost immediately after they became surplus to requirements.
• AND ensuring those players understood, could lead and ran the system themselves. How many former United players have gone onto be either managers or respected pundits upon retiring? Each iteration of successful United teams under Fergie are characterised by strong leaders running the show: Cantona, Keane, Ronaldo, Rooney etc.

Fergie's job description pretty much consists of just hair-drying and paperwork.

Maybe it isn't a new development that managers haven't been pivotal to a club's success, maybe it's just something that the repeated failures of so-called 'steady hands' this season are bringing to light. And maybe United's success over the years is singularly explicable by one manager who realised his limitations and set about making sure that everything he could change was done so to perfection. 

So in saying all of that, perhaps the trick to being a great manager is simply 'not trying to be a great manager'?

I don't know. All I do know is that 66% of members of Real Madrid think that the man who refers to himself as 'The Special One' isn't doing it for them anymore...

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