Uilleam

Masquerading as a midfielder.

Are diamonds not supposed to be...em.... hard, Jean-Jacques?

Niko Krancjar is a "Match of the Day"/ "Goals on Sunday" player: a highlights' editor's dream. When he is good, he is very, very good, but a lot of the time he is horrid, or, more properly, missing in action. When you throw in the propensity to suffer injury, he does not look like the man to build a midfield, far less a team around.

There is one thing to bear in mind about Brenda: he is a lucky manager, and, as Napoleon famously observed, the best generals are lucky generals.

I hope that we are not seeing a strategy, akin to that of McCoist, of signing other SPL teams' "best" players, with the belief (or fervent hope and prayer, more likely) that this will produce a team, rather than a random collection of somewhat variable talents. Surely PC is not so lazy and cynical?

Does Kilmarnock FC have a 'plastic' pitch? There may be the answer.

I think that everyone wants progress; that, however defined, will not happen with the current squad, which has, frankly, too many second raters. It is my considered opinion that even the combined talents of Guardiola, Mourinho, Ferguson, Wenger, Klopp, Pochettino, Conte, Gandalf the Grey, Harry Potter, Merlin, and Aleister fuckin' Crowley could not produce the alchemy required to turn the current base metal of the playing staff into even low carat Gerald Ratner gold. Hence, Stage 1: bring in some decent players, particularly for key positions. It is that bleedin' obvious.

Firstly, acquire some decent players.........

As long as the vehicles return empty (save for the drivers, of course).

You couldn't drive Waghorn to Scunthorpe, instead?

We might all join in unison to say, "It had better be, Pedro, it had better be."

What with the Dundee Hibs, hopefully, going down the shunky, are there any bargains to be had down Tannadice way? I thought that the boy Blair Spittal had something about him. A Rangers' man too, I believe

Nah. Therefore, they sold their best players to fhilthfootballclub, which, it would seem, is no longer minded to bail them out in similar fashion, this time round.

It's the players. He has an effete group of 2nd raters, bequeathed by Warburton. Lobbing Naismith into that mix will not help, particularly as he is likely to be on the largest salary.

You are probably correct. Angus Cook was vilified, and, if I recall accurately, run out of town by PC Murdoch, for suggesting such, some 20 or more years ago.

The Second Coming of Jum Spence: his first was farcical, his second will be tragic. Excellent.

From today's edition of The Times: https://www.thetimes.co.uk/edition/sport/klopp-i-do-the-one-thing-i-am-good-at-3vth9twl2 (Paywall) Interesting stuff, although I am not sure if the Gerrard observations are more party line than personal view; I mean who would willingly risk having club legend, fans' favourite, England hero, media darling, etc., breathing down one's neck? I should quite like to see this team, which Klopp suggests England fans & press expect, Italy’s defensive organisation, Spain’s midfield and the attack of Holland 20 years ago, although for me the model for international football remains Brazil 70. HENRY WINTER MEETS JÜRGEN KLOPP Jürgen Klopp: I do the one thing I am good at The Liverpool manager tells Henry Winter why he wants Gerrard to be next in line at Anfield Henry Winter, Chief Football Writer May 19 2017, 12:01am, The Times Jürgen Klopp’s love for Liverpool is focused on qualifying for the Champions League this weekend, strengthening a squad that he believes can compete in Europe, and nurturing Steven Gerrard as a future manager for the club. In an interview at Anfield yesterday, Klopp spoke about his “privilege” in overseeing Liverpool’s footballing fortunes, and his sense of responsibility for his legacy. “It’s perfect that we can involve Steven. What a guy, he’s fantastic,” Klopp said of the former captain, who is now under-18 coach. “He was one of the world’s best footballers ever. We had him last winter when he had a break in the USA [from LA Galaxy] and he had a few sessions with us, a few shooting sessions, and I thought what is that? His shooting. Unbelievable. “I told him when I leave, or the club sack me, I don’t care of course who’ll be my successor, but I’d love that he’d be it. I’ll do everything I can to make sure he gets all the information he needs. Because when you join a club you have a big responsibility for the future, and the future of this club needs legends like Steven Gerrard in decisive positions. Kenny Dalglish was pretty much everything in this club, and the feeling he creates just by being around is unbelievable. “[Gerrard] gave the club a lot and now we can give him the best education in this specific part he wants to work in, hopefully for the rest of his life. I’m privileged to be manager. I see all the pictures of Shankly, Paisley and so on. I felt from the first moment I came here it’s a big honour. I can’t stop thinking about it. Yes, there’s pressure but pressure is no problem. I came here because I can deal with pressure. We can imagine how many people started at the same point and I am here. Since I was 33 [when he stopped playing, and became coach at Mainz], I can do the only thing I’m really good at, and that’s a privilege.” Klopp made his name as a coach at Mainz, performed miracles at Borussia Dortmund and then moved to Anfield in October 2015. “The respect is outstanding here,” he says. “When I came everybody calls me boss or gaffer. OK, nice, but I have a name. If somebody wants to say ‘Jürgen’, I know that’s quite a difficult name obviously, I have no problem. Because I don’t think respect is related to how people call me. I know I can lead groups because I’m interested in each member of the group. I’m close to my players. I don’t like to come into a room and people are quiet.” He likes noise, vibrancy, unity. “At the highest level, you have no chance without tactics but the common desire, the togetherness makes a difference,” he says. For all the surfer look, laid-back air, and focus on the heart of his players, Klopp is incredibly organised. “I’m really strict in the things I have to be,” he says. He drills his players, improves them, making, for instance, Adam Lallana, the midfielder, far more effective. “When I came here I was really looking forward to working with him,” he says. “I couldn’t remember a bad game of his. I knew what a skilled boy he is.” Yet Lallana’s imposing his talent more consistently. “I’m sure he’d have done it anyway,” Klopp says. Klopp wants players to push their own ability to the maximum. “It’s not about trying to find a player who has the same mindset as Cristiano Ronaldo, Messi, Ibrahimovic, or Lewandowski, because you won’t find them,” he says. “It’s about making the best of the skills you have.” He coaxed a strong performance from Daniel Sturridge against West Ham United on Sunday. “A fit Sturridge is an unbelievable player,” he says. “That’s a pity of the situation, not often enough but he’s now fit, spot on, trained two or three weeks.” So Sturridge has a future here? “Of course." In entertaining, sparring mode, Klopp bristles at the suggestion that Liverpool’s back line is their weakness, arguing that defensive responsibilities have to be shared by all. “Somebody blocks a ball on the line, and you say ‘brilliant defending’ but it’s not; brilliant defending would have been if the guy couldn’t have had the shot,” he says. “Big heart, passionate moment, but the defending was s***. Defending is the team. “The more offensive you are, the more space you give the other team. We conceded too many goals [42 in the league]. Most of them come from counterattacks and set pieces, so losing the ball in the wrong moment, don’t have the protection, it’s our fault. If our defending wasn’t good, do you think I’d keep them? We can finish fourth, we play brilliant football in a few games this year, so when our squad is fully fit it’s a Champions League squad already, especially the [starting] line-up. “We have to be better next year and we will be. For this we need to bring in quality players. Believe me, it is not easy to find players who make us better. We are already good. We will find them because I love the combination of Liverpool [on offer to potential recruits]: the name, the size of the club, the support, the power, the money we can pay, stadium we have, the atmosphere we can create, I love it. It’s the biggest ever.” Klopp understands the club’s culture, and the huge emotion Liverpool arouse around the world. “Liverpool stands for history, fantastic stories, fantastic people working here, and who worked here,” he says. “It’s about the fans. When I’m in a petrol station, people talk to me about Liverpool but it’s fine, it’s not photo, photo, photo. I go to the same restaurants, everything cools down and I can have kind of a normal life. I’ve met Liverpool fans around the world. It’s a really hard trip to Australia [for a friendly against Sydney FC next week] but I really look forward to showing these boys our Australian fans; I heard there was this one game [in Melbourne in 2013], and there were 90,000 Liverpool fans.” The Hillsborough disaster, in which 96 fans died, features large in his thoughts. “When I came in, nobody had to tell me the story, I’d seen the [Jimmy McGovern] film. I knew about Hillsborough,” he says. “Now I know about how all the people are together, how the city is, and I really love how Everton is involved. We are really together, and that’s a wonderful thing. I talked to some of the families. The responsibility is big on the club for doing the right things and I like how the club do things the right way.” Klopp has things in perspective. “Football is not the most important thing in the world,” he says. “But I love that we all think it a few hours of the day. Football is how life should be: keep the good things and improve the bad things.” He bridles at the mention of money, revealing a romantic view of the game, “It isn’t all about the money. Yes, maybe that sounds strange because we all earn unbelievable big money but in the middle of everything is the game. “It’s a good moment to talk because yesterday I had this feeling that as long as things like Huddersfield winning the [Championship play-off] semi-final is possible almost everything’s possible. They have not the best players, and I love him [his friend David Wagner, who is head coach] but [he’s] not the world’s best manager, not Valery Lobanovskyi, but all together they can be the best. That’s so wonderful. The game’s not ruled by money. In England each club has money. So you have to make better decisions. As long as things like Leicester and Huddersfield are possible everything’s all right.” Patience is required. “Let’s talk about Pep Guardiola,” he says. “That’s a good idea. I don’t know him well but when we see each other, he seems a nice guy, so we talk about everything. Yes, we both want to win, we can’t be best friends on the sidelines, that’s impossible, but after the game we are [gives a thumbs up]. Manchester City play outstanding football but people say, ‘[Guardiola’s had] no impact, disappointing’. To create something takes time. How I started in Germany as a coach I had exactly the same players as before. No signings. No transfers. We only changed the way of playing. That changed everything. But what would you [the media] say here when something didn’t work? You say to the manager ‘which players would you bring in?’. I’m differently educated. I want to work with the team.” Yet Antonio Conte had an immediate impact on Chelsea. “I love Antonio,” he says. “What a fantastic guy. But I think even last year there was no doubt about the quality of Chelsea’s players. They had a punch, and then they come back. And Antonio has outstanding managing skills. He understands the game, so he saw what to do. Antonio’s really passionate and smart, and that’s a good combination, one you don’t have too often.” Klopp believes that Arsène Wenger has earned the right for patience. “We’ve spent the whole season fighting for the Champions League, and how often was he in the Champions League?” Nineteen seasons in a row — though they look set to be pipped to the top four by Klopp’s side and City on Sunday. “Nineteen. Wow. That’s the outstanding job he’s done,” Klopp says. “And in his time developing players, like 50,000 names: Thierry Henry — what a player — Robert Pires, Robin van Persie. Unbelievable. He had an eye for them, bring them in and working with them. From the other side of the water, it was, ‘Oh my God, Arsène Wenger. Unbelievable.’ “Look, we’re good at what we’re doing, that’s why we earn the money but we’re not geniuses. Sometimes you can’t cope with the problems. Sometimes I have too many players injured. I come in and say to the press, ‘Tomorrow, it’s really difficult, I have no idea how to line up because he’s injured, he’s half injured, he’s not injured yet but the medical department tells me if he plays one more time then he’s down.’ And everybody says, ‘Why’s he not playing?’ I can’t tell the truth. Sometimes the problems are too big.” Nobody had to tell me the story. I know how all the people are together, how the city is, and I really love how Everton is involved Jürgen Klopp, on the Hillsborough disaster Like fixture congestion and player exhaustion. “Everybody wants to talk about it but nobody wants to change anything,” he says. “When I got here, I cancelled two skiing holidays [which he would take in the winter break in Germany]. I love skiing.” Klopp thinks back to last year’s Europa League final, which Liverpool lost 3-1 to Seville. “The players were tired, 63 games, and then they had a [Euro 2016] tournament in the summer,” he says. So he has sympathy with José Mourinho’s critique of fixture pile-up and unsympathetic scheduling? “José had exactly one game more than we did because of the Community Shield,” he says. “But it’s Man United. Last year it was Liverpool, and nobody was really interested because we were eighth, we were three points behind the Europa League [places]. When the Germans have a winter break, we have ten games here but because of the money nobody cares about our problems, we have to sort them like this [clicks fingers]. “I talked to Michael Owen after the City game on December 31, and he said, ‘How are you going to line up at Sunderland [on January 2]?’ ‘No idea, but maybe you could give me some advice? How did you manage to do it two days later when you played?’ ‘I don’t know, I don’t think I played the second game.’ Funny. We had City, running like hell, trying to cope with them somehow and then go to Sunderland, playing against a wall, and they have every right to do it, we couldn’t cope with it, and it was 2-2. “So it’s ten games in England or no games in Germany, two weeks’ rest, not only physically but also mentally, you get together with your family when the whole world is together with their family and watch English football. I love it. I came here on Boxing Days to watch football. It’s cool to watch. I’d never talk about [scrapping] Boxing Day because that’s OK.” But a break in January? “Maybe we will find time to have two weeks,” he says. “You have to find the people who want to make this decision. But it’s not a problem because it’s the same for all the teams. They’re tired, we’re tired, go.” He remains positive about English clubs. “Second time an English club in a Europa League final in a row,” he says of United, who face Ajax in Stockholm on Wednesday. “You will see next year England will be in a good position in the Champions League, I’m 100 per cent sure about that. It is all in a good way if you have all these managers, and the money, and the players now in.” But what about the defending of Premier League clubs, which gets exposed in Europe? “[John] Stones [the City centre back] is a fantastic footballer, maybe he can improve defence, tactical wise, yes, that is clear, but 95 per cent of the time he is already brilliant” But where’s the English [Giorgio] Chiellini? “Chiellini and [Leonardo] Bonucci [of Juve] are Italian, ruthless, hard, not nice,” he says. Klopp chides the English dreamers: “You want to have the defensive organisation of Italy, the midfield fluency of Spain and the attacking of Holland 20 years ago.” He returns to the impact of the season’s workload on the national team. “England go to the summer big tournament, and do you think the year they had has an influence on their [abject] performance?” Of course. “That’s logical. England has a fantastic league; with the national team you are not that confident but the players are fantastic.” Are they really good enough? “What? Shall we go through them,” he says. “I will forget one or two but, look, left full back, Bertrand, Rose. Centre half, Stones, Smalling, Jones, Cahill, Keane. Right full back, Walker, Clyne. Fantastic. Goalkeeper. Butland, of course Joe Hart, next one is coming, Pickford. Good. Midfield? Six different players, first of all Jordan Henderson plays the role fantastically. Eric Dier, of course, he’s fantastic, whichever system you want to play. Lallana, Alli, all these guys, fantastic football players. Up front, more strikers than Germany. People say it’s not that good. Not so. “What I heard about English players before I came here is the old stories about drinking, but I never believed it. The other thing I heard is that they cannot shoot penalties. And I think the English thought about the Germans, ‘Look at them, always busy, they’d rather come five minutes too early, rather than five minutes too late’. But I live here and we are so similar in everything. We all love English music. That’s a big advantage you have because the language is outstanding.” Klopp loves the English obsession with sport. “You have the promotion [play-off] from non-League to League Two in Wembley. Tranmere played Forest Green. It’s cool. You can spend the whole day here watching different sports,” he says. “Commonwealth Games, nice kind of sports. I’ve still not got cricket, hopefully when I leave in five, six, seven years, I will understand the results in cricket. You love sport here. It’s unbelievable. I love it.”

Damned few, and they're a' deid, I imagine.....

I am against the idea of fading 'legends' (whatever) returning, as a rule. It rarely ends happily, and I think that such manoevres often are designed for PR and retail purposes. With PC in charge it would be counter productive to attempt to turn the clock back, or to ask/require him to do so.

Latterly, if memory serves, Stein was treated quite shabbily by rasellik board, insultingly being offered the post of Pools Manager, or something similar. A less than classy way to treat a 'legend'. I have often wondered if this was because he was, as they say, a non-cafflick, or because he was the guy who 'sacked' Torbett (despite their being no connection between rasellik and rasellik boys' club whatsoever, no sir).

It's never good to see a team go to the wall. In this case, I make an exception.

A piece from The Guardian, today, on the legendary Hungarian coach, and his world beating Benfica side. https://www.theguardian.com/football/2017/may/18/bela-guttmann-benfica-european-cup-eusebio Béla Guttmann and the barber’s trip that helped Benfica win the European Cup The legendary coach’s signing of Eusébio followed a chance meeting in an unusual location and Benfica’s path to a second straight European Cup triumph in 1962 showed Guttmann was a man ahead of his time David Bolchover Thursday 18 May 2017 17.53 BST First published on Thursday 18 May 2017 13.30 BST Win a major sporting trophy once and the naysayers will dismiss the success as random luck. Win it twice and the same people are forced to eat their words. The 1961-62 season was when Benfica’s Béla Guttmann wrote his name in the pantheon of coaching greats. A chance meeting in the unlikely venue of a barber’s shop, several months before the first European Cup victory, also with Benfica, had paved the way for further success. Guttmann bumped into José Carlos Bauer, a former Brazil international, who was coaching Ferroviária in his native country, and whom he rated as a shrewd judge of the game. “He greeted me happily, saying they were on a tour [in Lisbon] and they’d soon go to Africa,” recalled Guttmann. “I told him: ‘Listen to me, old man, if you see a talented player for me, someone who was born in Portugal, keep his name in mind.’ A month after this conversation, I was at the barber’s again, and as if I was telling you a joke, Bauer came in again. ‘What’s up? Have you found anyone for me?’ ‘Oh,’ he said, ‘I saw a black lad in Mozambique … I wanted to get him for myself … but those fools are asking for $20,000 for him!’ ‘What’s the lad called?’ His face was being lathered as he blurted out: ‘Eusébio!’” Eusébio da Silva Ferreira had been playing for Sporting de Lourenço Marques. Sporting Lisbon regarded their namesake in Mozambique’s capital as their feeder club, and went berserk when they found out that Guttmann had usurped their supposed rights, signing the highly promising striker for their bitter rivals instead. A Sporting director turned up at Eusébio’s door and offered him 500,000 escudos, a huge sum of money for an 18-year-old, to change his mind. “He put the money on the table and told me that it was mine if I signed for Sporting,” Eusébio recalled. “I told him that it was a low thing to do, that I wasn’t mad and I wasn’t going to sign two contracts.” Guttmann had stolen a march, and not by sheer luck either. The master networker had spent decades building up his contacts, and one of them had led him to this future star. He tenaciously held on to his advantage. Eusébio was hidden in Lagos in the Algarve for 12 days for fear that Sporting would try to swoop again. “I sent three bodyguards to hang around him and I told them my orders,” said Guttmann. “Eusébio cannot be left alone, not for a minute, and he can only stay at the Benfica house.” When Eusébio did emerge for his first Benfica training session in early 1961, Guttmann stood on the sidelines, purring with pleasure at his sly capture, transfixed by Eusébio’s devastating acceleration, explosive shot and ability to glide past opponents. Unable to contain himself, he eventually turned to his assistant Fernando Caiado, shouting “O menino é ouro!” (The boy is gold!). Ineligible, as a recent signing, for the European Cup, Eusébio made his debut in a domestic friendly the week before the 1960-61 European Cup final where Benfica beat Barcelona 3-2, scoring a hat-trick. He scored again on his league debut a couple of weeks later, before being named as a substitute against Pelé’s Santos in a close season international tournament in Paris in June 1961. With his tired team 4–0 down at half-time, Guttmann looked to the bench and called for his new gem. “I sent him on and he scored three goals, all of them from a 20–25 metre distance,” he said. The next day, the French sports newspaper L’Équipe ignored the result of the match, instead running the headline “Eusébio 3 Pelé 2”. Guttmann now had his passport to footballing immortality. He had transformed the Estádio da Luz into an impregnable fortress, and his team into a force that inspired fear throughout the continent of Europe. If the route to the 1961 final had been relatively straightforward, the hurdles this time round continued to get steeper. In the semi-final came Tottenham Hotspur, who had the previous season become the first team in the 20th century to win the English League and FA Cup double, and who had already taken apart Poland’s Górnik Zabrze and Czechoslovakia’s Dukla Prague. Guttmann knew he had to be at his absolute best to get his team through, and he didn’t disappoint. The eventual outcome of the tie between these two great sides, a narrow victory for Benfica, owed much to the box of wily tricks he had assembled during 30 long years as a coach throughout the world. His adversary, the relatively inexperienced Bill Nicholson, lost out in the battle of the small details, a fatal defeat in such an evenly matched confrontation. Nicholson failed to prepare his team psychologically for the inevitable early onslaught in Lisbon. Goals by Simões and José Augusto put Benfica two up within 20 minutes, before Spurs had even settled into the game. Even though Spurs dominated the second half and Smith got one back, another goal from the inspired José Augusto meant that Benfica were to bring a 3–1 lead to London for the second leg. A good lead, but one which Guttmann knew could evaporate in just a few minutes of frenzied action at a packed and raucous White Hart Lane, with the home fans electrified by the possibility of their team becoming the first English representative in a European Cup Final. He did everything in his power to stop that happening. His main weapon was the media. “When I go to the press conference before the game,” José Mourinho once said, “in my mind the game has already started.” Alex Ferguson agrees: “At a press conference you need to come out as the winner.” Football analysts routinely point to such comments as evidence of these coaches’ acute awareness, their ability to sense the subtle influence of media messages on the psychology of players. Béla Guttmann was doing exactly the same thing more than 50 years ago. A large English press pack were camped at his team’s base at the Park Lane Hotel to cover a game which had captured more public attention in England than any against a foreign team since Hungary’s visit in 1953. To allow his tense players to rest and relax in private, Guttmann’s opening move was to shift the spotlight to himself. He reiterated his intention, first hinted at a few months before, to leave Benfica at the end of the season. As usual, he was less than fully honest about the reasons, which would only become apparent later, claiming that he had taken the team as far as he could and craved a fresh challenge. Next, he sought to sway the course of the game more directly. He worried that his Portuguese players were insufficiently accustomed to the typically British physicality of players like Dave Mackay and Bobby Smith. “I told the journalists that I expected a bloodbath and they, in turn, went to Poulsen, the Danish referee, and told him Guttmann did not think he was strong enough to handle the match,” he later recounted. “It was an old ploy, but it worked. Poulsen kept a close check on those players, and we got more than our share of free-kicks.” In those days, the two teams would come out for the start of the game separately. Whereas Guttmann allowed Spurs to come out first in Lisbon, where they were made to wait for their opponents amid the din like gladiators in the colosseum, he made sure his own team would not suffer the same fate in London. “I locked the dressing-room door and only let Benfica go out at the last minute, with the referee and linesmen,” he said. “The game started before the crowd got at us.” Benfica went one up after 15 minutes at White Hart Lane, with Águas converting a cross from Simões. Smith levelled the score on the night before half-time, and Blanchflower converted a penalty early in the second half. Spurs were just one behind on aggregate, and the crowd scented blood. The Benfica team, however, was to show the same resolve that had got them through in Bern against Barcelona. With Costa Pereira making save after save, and Germano once again a rock in the centre of defence, they reached the final by the skin of their teeth, owing a considerable debt of gratitude to their maestro, soon-departing, coach. Guttmann had decided to leave because of money. Having brought Benfica and Portuguese football unprecedented glory, he believed that the directors of the club should be bending over backwards to keep him, not quibbling over salary demands and minor expenses. He asked for a salary increase of 65% if Benfica were to win the European Cup a second time, only to be met by a non-committal response. As time drifted on, he was further irritated by an incident after the quarter-final in Nuremberg. His wife, Mariann, had gone with him and the team to Germany – a rare occurrence. Back in Lisbon a few days after the game, Guttmann received a bill from the club – for half the cost of his hotel room. In spite of his clear brilliance, it seemed that old attitudes were not shifting easily. The club hierarchy still couldn’t quite believe that a coach could be so important, and their penny-pinching reflected a foolish insouciance. “I am the most expensive coach in the world, but looking at my achievements, I’m actually cheap,” Guttmann said a couple of years later. Just as there was a push factor for him leaving, there was also a pull. There was an attractive offer on the table from Uruguay, his next port of call. By stubbornly insisting on his value, we can say that Guttmann set in motion an upward ratchet in coaching pay that is continuing to this day. But before his eventual departure from Lisbon, he was to face the biggest single game and greatest challenge of his coaching career. On 2 May 1962, in the Olympic Stadium in Amsterdam, Benfica took on the mighty Real Madrid in the European Cup final. Again, Guttmann’s team were underdogs. Real had won the Spanish league. They had annihilated Standard Liège in the semi-final. And their team contained the ageing but still brilliant duo – Ferenc Puskás and Alfredo Di Stéfano. Guttmann’s mastery of human psychology was evident once more. Everything he said before and during the final was calculated to counter the inevitable fear, with one message to the fore: they are history, you are the present, you will win. “Straight after the semi-final against Tottenham, he was building us up, telling us: ‘We are going to be champions again,’” recalls António Simões. In the dressing room just before the kick-off, he sat his team down, and told them about his experiences at the 1924 Olympics. “I had the opportunity to meet some well-known celebrities, including the Finnish idol, Paavo Nurmi,” he said. “He ran the 5,000 metres in what was regarded then as a superhuman time, 14:31. In the 1960 Olympics, an unknown New Zealander [Murray Halberg] beat his time by almost a minute.” In sport, he was at pains to convey, time does not stand still. Benfica needed all the self-belief they could muster. They were down early on by two goals, both scored by Puskás. Again, they rallied. Águas got a goal back after Eusébio’s free-kick hit a post. Then Cavém rifled a long-distance shot into the top corner. A frenetic half of football ended with the deadly left foot of Puskás restoring Real’s lead. There was work to do in the dressing room at half-time. Guttmann may be best known for his teams’ attacking talents, but he was no slouch in defensive organisation either. In order to isolate Puskás and deprive him of service, he told the versatile Cavém to stick closely to Di Stéfano. With tactics out of the way, and less than 15 minutes to play with at the interval, he moved to the mind. He had told his players before the kick-off that they would win against their older opponents if they were only two down at half-time. Now, it turned out, the deficit was only one. “Guttmann said to us: ‘Gentlemen, we’re going to win, we’re stronger than Real Madrid!’” recalls José Augusto. “The important thing about those words was the belief and conviction with which he said them, and that conviction transferred to us. He gave so much strength because he spoke with such force. It was as if a divine force had entered us!” Simões echoes his former team-mate’s recollections. “We really had the belief we could win the game. I remember Guttmann in his own special language, a sort of mix of Portuguese and Italian, telling us: ‘Mister, sit down, mister, sit down, Real Madrid tired, Real Madrid tired, Real Madrid old, old, old, they cannot win, Real Madrid cannot run, Di Stéfano dead.’ That moment really struck us.” After five minutes of the second half, it was 3–3. For the second European Cup final in succession, Coluna had scored a spectacular goal with his weaker right foot. From that moment on, it was to be the Eusébio Show, as irrepressible youth triumphed over ageing experience. Running from his own half past tiring defenders, the so-called Black Pearl waltzed into the Real area and was brought down. Leo Horn pointed to the spot, and Eusébio himself calmly dispatched the penalty. Five minutes later, it was all over. Eusébio’s deflected shot ended up in the corner of the net to make it 5–3. Real Madrid knew they were beaten. They were gone – tired, old and dead. Guttmann was carried off the pitch by his players. At the winners’ banquet that night, Guttmann was in his element, sharing memories at a Hungarian-speaking table. How satisfied and content he must have felt, the 63-year-old two-times European Cup winner, chatting the night away with friends and colleagues from his now illustrious career. Some guests at the banquet approached Guttmann and begged him to stay in Lisbon. But angered by the directors’ intransigence and parsimony, and with the world at his feet, he was having none of it. With a wave and a curse, he was gone. This is an edited extract from The Greatest Comeback: From Genocide To Football Glory, the story of Béla Guttman, by David Bolchover. It is published by Biteback Publishing on 18 May

From today's Guardian, a valedictory salute to a special player.... https://www.theguardian.com/football/englische-woche/2017/may/18/philipp-lahm-germany-bayern-munich-world-cup-bundeliga Farewell Philipp Lahm, the man who won it all and left as a champion Philipp Lahm has won eight Bundesliga titles, six German cups, the Champions League and the World Cup. Now he is going out at the top By Jason Humphreys for Englische Woche, part of the Guardian Sport Network Jason Humphreys Thursday 18 May 2017 16.02 BST Last modified on Thursday 18 May 2017 16.42 BST It’s 18:06 on Friday 20 June 2006 and 66,000 people, mostly clad in Germany colours, have packed into Munich’s shiny new Allianz Arena on a warm evening to watch the first match of the World Cup. The crowd is bouncing, buoyed by the home team’s tenacious start and still drawing breath following a 30-yard shot from Thorsten Frings that narrowly missed the net. Noise levels begin to swell again as Philipp Lahm picks up a loose ball wide on the left. He is faced with two Costa Rica defenders. Bastian Schweinsteiger is offering the overlap, but Lahm drops his right shoulder and shifts the ball inside quickly with his right foot, leaving Danny Fonseca on his backside. The Costa Rica player lands heavily and, as he glances over his shoulder, the next thing he sees is Lahm opening up his body and winding back his right foot. Lahm blasts the ball past everyone in the area and into the top right corner, the ball kissing the post on its way in. Six minutes in, and the first chapter of Germany’s Sommermärchen has been written. Lahm was an instrumental and respected footballer but, even in that moment, as he scored the opening goal at a World Cup in his home city, few of the millions watching would have predicted just how important he would become for his club and country over the next decade. Born in Munich 33 years ago, Lahm began his long career with Bayern when he joined the youth team in 1995 from local club FT Gern München. Having started life as a forward, Lahm soon found his home as a full-back, mostly operating on the left. Despite being an obvious talent, his path into Bayern’s first team was blocked by two formidable French defenders, Bixente Lizarazu and Willy Sagnol. So the one-club man began his career on loan at another club, a short hop from Bavaria to Baden-Württemberg. Hermann Gerland, now Carlo Ancelotti’s right-hand man, was then in charge of the Bayern reserves and felt Lahm was too good to play with his team in the third division, so he recommended him to VfB Stuttgart manager Felix Magath, who duly organised a two-year loan deal. After making his Bundesliga debut on the opening day of the 2003-04 season, Lahm soon became Stuttgart’s first-choice left-back. Aside from a couple of injuries, his time in Stuttgart was a success. He returned to Munich having made 53 appearances in the Bundesliga and picked up some Champions League experience. Loan moves do not always work out, but Lahm’s stint on the banks of the river Neckar paid dividends for all parties involved, not least Bayern, who suddenly had a new full-back, and a German international to boot. Lahm’s form in Stuttgart had catapulted him into the senior Germany squad, where he soon claimed ownership of the left-back slot. He had won 15 caps for his country before his Bayern Munich career had properly begun. It would have been more but for an injury sustained towards the end of his loan spell, which not only temporarily curtailed his international progression but also delayed his long-awaited Bundesliga debut for his parent club. Eventually, Lahm took to the pitch for Bayern in November 2005 and established himself as the club’s left-back, ushering Lizarazu into retirement. As with the majority of players of Lahm’s generation, winning the World Cup in Brazil has to be seen as the pinnacle, but it was the 2006 tournament on home soil that elevated Germany back on to the world stage after their dour showing at Euro 2004, where they were knocked out at the group stage without winning a game. And it was at this hotly anticipated and feverishly supported tournament that this unassuming and unspectacular player made perhaps his most famous contribution. His opening goal lit up an emotional summer that brought back some national pride and touched German society well beyond the confines of football. Players and fans alike had been whipped into a feelgood frenzy by the World Cup and Lahm returned to what would become a decade of near omnipresence in the Bayern team. Although Bayern finished an almost unimaginable fourth in the Bundesliga in the 2006-07 season, they have gone on to dominate, winning the title in seven of the last 10 years. In Europe, however, success has not always been forthcoming. Lahm only tasted the glory of winning the Champions League after he had lost two finals: against José Mourinho’s impenetrable Inter side in 2010 and then the infinitely more bitter defeat against Chelsea in the ill-fated “finale dahoam” in Munich two years later. Lahm and Bayern bounced back from those heartaches in spectacular fashion. Now the captain of both club and country, he shouldered more responsibility and also developed as a player. By the start of the 2012-13 season, which would be his most decorated, he had clocked up just as many appearances on the right side of defence. Lahm had entered the second phase of his career as a roving right-back, almost a deep-lying right-sided playmaker, charged with more than simply overlapping and whipping in crosses. He was an ideal foil for Arjen Robben, with whom he formed a deadly duo on that flank. Robben’s now infamous left-foot inswingers win games and grab headlines, but more often than not Lahm’s pass or movement off the ball enabled the Dutchman to gain the extra half-yard required to make the incisive move infield. Lahm also chipped in with 11 assists in the 2012-13 season, becoming the first defender in the league’s history to hit double figures. His relationship with Robben was just one component in a season when everything came together and culminated in Beryn winning a glorious, record-breaking treble under Jupp Heynckes. Both Heynckes and Lahm had the good fortune of being part of a very special group, with players such as Bastian Schweinsteiger, Franck Ribéry, Thomas Müller, Jérôme Boateng, Manuel Neuer and Toni Kroos hitting top form alongside emerging talents such as David Alaba and Xherdan Shaqiri. Lahm played the entire treble-winning season at right-back, but things were about to change. Fresh from a year-long sabbatical, Pep Guardiola arrived in Munich in 2013 with big ideas and even bigger expectations. He walked into a dressing room of Champions League-winners with the aim of changing things for the better. The degree to which Guardiola was a success is a popular debate, but one specific tactical tweak certainly bore fruit. Bayern’s clash with Chelsea in the Uefa Super Cup early in his first season pitted him against Mourinho. Half an hour into the game, Bayern were losing 1-0 and being suffocated by Chelsea. Guardiola was looking for a way out. In his book Pep Confidential, Martí Perarnau reports that it was Guardiola’s assistant, Domenec Torrent, who suggested moving Lahm from right-back into a defensive midfield role, mid-game, to wrestle back control of the ball. This was not the first time Lahm had played in midfield. In an uninspiring friendly against England in 2007, Lahm had appeared as a No6 in a starting XI bereft of many of the previous summer’s heroes. Guardiola had seen enough of Lahm in training to know he was wasted as a full-back and could be more than a destroyer in midfield. In Lahm, Guardiola saw someone capable of anticipating passes, protecting the ball and instigating attacks. The game turned in Bayern’s favour and Guardiola suddenly had a new crux of his team, a new pivot. Guardiola has since called Lahm the most intelligent player he has coached. His latest metamorphosis was another blurring of the lines between defence and midfield. It made him the perfect player to adopt Guardiola’s intricate tactical plans, allowing other players such as David Alaba, Xabi Alonso and Rafinha to rotate and float between positions. Lahm is a master of receiving the ball and taking it forward in the same movement, his body often deliberately leaning forward. He glides over the field, not just shuttling up and down the right flank, but also drifting deliberately infield, penetrating crowded midfields from a deep right position. And, as his responsibilities were increasingly found in the centre of the pitch, he often took on the role of problem-solver and pacesetter. Lahm’s ability to adopt ideas of what an inverted full-back should be may even have given Guardiola problems in his first season in Manchester; as good and experienced as Pablo Zabaleta, Bacary Sagna and Gaël Clichy may be, they are not Lahm. Lahm may look like every mother-in-law’s dream, but he can rock the boat if he deems it necessary. Unlike other quiet and unassuming stars who keep their opinions to themselves before becoming critical and controversial once they have hung up their boots, Lahm’s most infamous comments came slap bang in the middle of his career, aged 27. In an interview with the Süddeutsche Zeitung in 2009, Lahm accused the Bayern board of working without a defined plan and buying players without a clear philosophy of how to fit them into a tactical system. His comments were not the act of a disgruntled star throwing his toys out of the pram, but someone totally ingrained in the club giving an honest and considered opinion. Having been raised at a club marked by the footprints of vocal, alpha male leaders such as Steffen Effenberg, Oliver Kahn and Michael Ballack, Lahm has been partly responsible for ushering in a different kind of leadership for his club and country, one characterised less by outward aggression and displays of passion, and more by quiet pragmatism, calculation – and no less inspirational. Manuel Neuer is favourite to succeed him as captain and, although the extra responsibility will not weigh down his broad shoulders, filling the void on the pitch may be a different matter. Hopes will undoubtedly be pinned on Joshua Kimmich, but the youngster has had limited opportunities under Ancelotti thus far and the reality is that Bayern may have to recruit two players to compensate for Lahm’s departure. Not only are the club waving goodbye to one of Europe’s best full-backs over the last decade or so, but also an outstanding midfielder with a head full of tactical nous and experience. It is one thing to perform consistently for over a decade at an elite club where mediocrity is not tolerated, but it is something else to have the ability and willingness to continually adapt and evolve your position. Lahm could easily extend his career at a number of elite clubs abroad. Who wouldn’t take a punt on someone with his pedigree, consistency and flexibility? But he has no desire to extend his playing career or boost his bank balance. Lahm has a knack of going out at the top, having packed in international football the day after he lifted the World Cup into the night sky in Rio de Janeiro in 2014. Interestingly, one thing Lahm said during that controversial interview with the Süddeutsche Zeitung in 2009 was that Bayern needed a new type of midfielder – one defenders could look for as a point of reference, an escape route in the centre of the park. He gave prominent examples of players who love possession, such as Andrés Iniesta and Xavi. He was criticised at the time but he turned into the very player he had described. In his final press conference as a Bayern player this week, Lahm said: “I just hope that the fans will remember me as a good footballer.” He did that and then some. After winning eight Bundesliga titles, six German cups, a Champions League and the World Cup, Lahm will lead out Bayern Munich at the Allianz Arena for the last time on Saturday afternoon. The chances are he won’t find the top corner like he did 11 years ago against Costa Rica, but you can guarantee the stadium will be rocking just as it did back in 2006. • This article is from Englische Woche • Follow Englische Woche on Twitter Not a bad CV -Philipp Lahm has won eight Bundesliga titles, six German cups, the Champions League and the World Cup- but Xabi Alonso, also hanging up the boots, just shades it.......

A Bentley (from the days when Bentleys were Bentleys).

He inherited a rather straitened squad, with injuries adding to the problem, and one assembled to play Warburton's system. A lot of the players are journeymen, good enough for 3rd in the SPL, but no more. Recruitment of players from lower leagues means that they are likely to be limited technically, and also tactically, the teams in these leagues not being regarded as sophisticated in that regard. What is noticeable is the rather effete way they approach games, with little in the way of competitive spirit, far less grunt, drive, and hard yards. I think that this can be laid at Warburton's door. I think that PC is damned if he does something, and damned if he doesn't. For example, he may flood the midfield with players he sees (and we know) are a little short of required standards, and will be criticised for so doing; or vice versa. I think that we will only see if he is worth his salt next season, after modification of the squad. I would say, in his favour, is that he is a serious minded intellectual coach, and on that basis I should expect the development teams to produce players with a higher degree of tactical education and nous than has maybe been the case in the past. We may also see some of them attaining and maintaining a place in the 1st XI. Some people will not be happy, including those who do not have Rangers' interests at heart, until Derek McInnes is installed as Manager. I don't know why; he has had several years to build a squad, and his side is no nearer challenging the fhilth than it has been since Ferguson.