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THE REASSURING PREFIX 1-9-06
Calum Law
Not only does Rafael Benitez look and sound like a VAT Inspector, he also shares that profession's shrewd and dogged nature. Finally securing long-time target Dirk Kuyt, he unleashed the Dutchman on a floundering West Ham for the most impressive debut half hour the Premiership has seen for many a year.
Striking an instant rapport with Benitez' other summer bargain, Craig Bellamy, it looked like Mourinho's worst nightmare may indeed come to pass: the geek shall inherit the earth.
Along the M62, Christiano Ronaldo's role as pantomime-villain-in-chief looked to be under threat as the only footballer more sullen and charmless than the improbably fat-necked Portuguese, i.e. Anelka, arrived in town in a puffa coat (those icy August chills an' all) to form a Whingers Dream Team with Big Face Allardyce. Not since the 'brains of a rocking horse' union of Peter Andre and Jordan was something just so meant to be.
Allardyce (prime among the breed of manager who'll blame the referee, the pitch, the cheating opposition, the mascots, rather than admit an honest defeat) used to support a Magnum P.I.-syle moustache. One suspects he was the type who held on to his facial forest creature way too long as his friends - aware of the symbolic appropriation by the Muscle Mary fraternity - sniggered behind his back.
Sam ("that's Big Sam to you son!") regularly sends out a team capable of playing football. It's just that they don't usually bother - prefering to lump it to the hefty lad with the sharp elbows. Despite his team's agricultural approach, Big was nevertheless tabloid readers favourite to be England manager - admittedly from a poor field. Fortunately his 'pick me sir!' pleading came to nought and he and his headset will not be gracing the international stage just yet, or hopefully ever. We eagerly await Anelka's reaction to being told to 'sniff out Kev's knockdowns son, and get in where it hurts.'
Down the road at Anelka's last Premiership victims, the archetypal Big Manager Malcolm Allison watched, as yet again, honest yeomanry bested fancy foreign frippery. And as I took in Boro's feeble capituation on Monday night, I was reminded of a somewhat curious quote of Allison's many years ago when he was interviewed after a long spell working abroad.
'I was saying years ago that the English don't kick it with the right part of the foot,' ran the gist of his outburst, 'and I've come back twenty years later and they still don't.'
What he meant was that English players still didn't trust themselves to trap and pass the ball with the sweet spot of the foot - the front of the instep - but routinely used the more forgiving side of the foot. What this means is that instead of playing 'on your toes' - witness the speed and fluidity of movement of Barcelona, Arsenal - your weight is distributed on the heels.
I've no wish to lambast a seventeen-year-old kid, and I've only see him play half a dozen times on TV, but I would suggest that something is still amiss in the English game if Lee Cattermole is being talked of as a future England captain by his youth team coach, who in the next breath declares: 'Lee would be the first to admit that he's not technically good' (my italics).
Cattermole cannot be blamed for Monday's debacle; as both Toby Higgins and Watson and Warnock have correctly asserted, Southgate sent out the wrong team - one lacking midfield penetration. Cattemole's an honest kid and the game will always need his type, but just as the reassuring presence of a Big in defence or on the bench can be a curse in disguise so the lionising of a homegrown 'enforcer' can retard an honest appraisal of a team's virtues.
The best player on show on Monday night was a Nigerian who's been long-derided as an ornate misfit. As the saying goes: be careful what you wish for.
NOW HAVE YOUR SAY IN THE NEW HOLGATE FORUM
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