ENGLAND – The Football Association have begun their search for the “right candidate” to lead the national team to a suitably embarrassing quarter-final tournament defeat.
FA chairman David Bernstein announced plans last week to replace Fabio Capello with someone who has the ability to “take this England team all the way to being knocked out of a major international tournament at least two rounds earlier than expected.”
Mr Bernstein said he expected “to move quickly”, but stressed the process of finding the person capable of delivering consistently below average results would not be rushed.
Low bar
Current England under 21 coach Stewart Pearce will take caretaker charge of the game against Holland and FA officials have backed Pearce to get apathetic performances out of the team from the start “until we can find someone to make a right mess of things on a permanent basis.”
While he admitted the role of England manager was a difficult one, he pointed to a tradition of managers who have successfully moulded the nation’s top footballing talent to consistently under perform below even the most modest expectations.
While FA bosses acknowledged the current front-runner Harry Redknapp, privately it’s thought the Tottenham boss’ success in the Premier League has led the FA to question whether he could delivery the level of mediocrity that was expected at international level.
Journalist Oliver Holt suggested the free-flowing football being displayed by Redknapp’s team would be a major setback to his cause to become England manager.
“Harry has that team playing expansive football uninhibited by any fear of wearing the team shirt – clearly that’s not what the FA are looking for.”
Right man for the job
FA general secretary Alex Horne refused to go into specifics regarding the names under consideration when outing the process to find the man to “take this country to the quarter-finals stages and no further.”
“Clearly the right candidate must have a big reputation that has no relation to international football,” he stated. “He needs to be comfortable working for four to six times what he is worth.”
“We’re looking of someone who could boldly proclaim this team have a real chance of winning the World Cup after a laboured 1-0 win over a team ranked forty-second or below,” added Horne.
“And most importantly, he must be able to properly prepare the players to mentally collapse at the mere prospect of a penalty shootout.”
In awe of that anewsr! Really cool!