From Royston Reeves :
Myles, You’re bang wrong about Moyes.
He won’t succeed at United.
He’ll spend his first few years huffing and puffing while Mourinho, David Luiz, Falcao and Ramires form a spine that will make the rest of the Premier League look silly.
Chelsea to break their own record PL points total? I wouldn’t bet against it.
Moyes is no fool, but he’s not a slick operator.
Football management isn’t about tough, wily Scots any more.
It’s about the technicians and those who can motivate players in spite of the interference of media and agents.
More to the point: football’s mostly about the players now.
Didier Drogba can stand in front of an interviewer with a straight face and say “I’ll leave Chelsea for whoever pays the most money”.
In his autobiography, Paul Merson says George Graham would never make it as a manager now because Premier League players wouldn’t stick his tough training routines; and they wouldn’t stand for a sergeant major telling them what to do, and he’s right. Graham used to have Arsenal players doing shuttle runs up and down the steps inside Highbury on Thursday mornings.
Ferguson was the last of his kind. There’s no place for a Moyes or a George Graham at the top table because football is too slick for them now. We have our World Cups in Qatar, now.
Moyes has never even tried to win a big game at Everton. He has played for a draw in every single big game he’s played.
And when he finally had a Champions’ League play-off against Villarreal where he could have shown that he can win big games, he blew it, and blamed Pierluigi Collina.
Drawing big games is much easier than winning them. If Man United just wanted someone who could draw their big games for them, they should have taken Mark Hughes at half the price.
At Man United, Moyes will have to be a bit more inventive and decisive going forward when they play away from home. And striking that balance is a different ball game.
Everton have won four away games this season. FOUR! That’s less than Wigan Athletic.
Forget the ‘heritage’ of the club, United should have employed a mercenary like Hiddink, Van Gaal, Capello or even Mourinho for a few years until Klopp is available. They are going to lose a lot of ground over the next few years under Moyes.
Actually, forget Mourinho. I don’t think even Klopp could sort out the footballing nuclear winter that follows a Mourinho tenure.
All the best, Royston
P.S. I’m 100 pages into The Professor.
I had to stop reading and stick my head out of the window for air when I read how close we were to signing Seedorf.
Don’t do that to me again.
Myles says:
Everton are the unluckiest club in British football.
Howard Kendall wins the title twice in style but Heysel gets British clubs banned from Europe.
When Moyes make a play-off to get into the CL, he draws a Spanish team that is the third best football outfit in the Europe at that time.
Villarreal took Arsenal into the 90th minute.
It was very,very hard to beat that Villarreal side in 2006.
Arsenal couldn’t do it until Jens Lehmann saved that very late penalty from Riquelme.
Most Gooners remember that drama vividly.
This morning I don’t have time to reply to you properly, so I’ll just say 3 things
One, Sir Alex chose Moyes.
Sir Alex has been a colossal manager and knows what his job requires far better than we do.
Two, I think David Moyes will hit the ground running and prove to be a better tactician than Ferguson.
Three, Moyes already knows the United players rather well.
One small question, Royston:
Are you reading The Professor as a paperback or digitally?