The problem with English football

The clock ticked past 2.15 on a Wednesday afternoon. This was a biology lesson. The teacher was explaining eagerly why photosynthesis is crucial to the ecosystem. I did not care about biology. I did not care about photosynthesis. At that time, I did not really care for the ecosystem. Yet here I was with four other third set lads waiting to leave.

 The school had an important football match. It was the semi-final of the district cup. My year was particularly good at football. I was usually a substitute. But the three others in this class were outstanding. The team could have done without me. But the team could not have done without them.

 The game was being played two miles away. As usual, we would travel there by walking for half an hour. There was no funding for a school bus. Being early spring, darkness was falling at around 6.30.pm. In order for school football matches be completed in time, the kick off had to be early. In theory, it occasionally meant that classes would have to be sacrificed. Surely it would be no big deal. Surely missing one or two biology lessons would not alter the destination of a human being. There were ways of catching up on lost time: over lunch perhaps - maybe just doing extra homework.

 But no - it would not be so simple. Sport does not really fit into the state education system – especially something like football: unruly, aggressive and competitive. Attending one or two more biology classes will teach you more in the long term than being a part of a successful group. Apparently.

 I was never going to be a footballer. I was never going to be a biologist. Although the other lads were never going to be biologists either, they were determined enough to become footballers. With the right guidance, it might have happened.

 That did not matter here. By leaving at 2.15, it would have allowed enough time to reach the ground, get changed, warm-up properly, have a laugh in the dressing room and get going. Yet the message had not been transmitted. The school had always boasted successful football teams. But this was an era of OFSTED reports, education, education and education. Maybe it did not intend to turn out like this, but football did not seem to be considered as education. It was all about achieving the right results, pass rates being hit and a path to university. Any person or any institution that did not conform was left behind. Sixteen-year-olds did not have apprenticeships. Schools were shut down. It was an industrial education with scant consideration for the individual.

 Perhaps this all contributed towards why, at 2.50, the teacher finally permitted our departure. It meant we arrived 30 minutes late: no time for a warm up - just straight into the game. One of the budding biologists got injured early on. Another just wasn’t his usual self. It went to extra time. We were not prepared. There was no energy left. We lost. We deserved to lose.

 This week, I discovered that one of the boys in the opposition was scouted by a professional club, partly as a result of his performance in this game. Now aged 30, he has enjoyed a reasonably successful career and is currently playing abroad.

 The point of this story is simple. We say football is engrained culturally in this country. Yet this is at odds with what is really happening in education and above that, in government.

 For football to flourish, there needs to be a shift in culture. The FA could, indeed, do a lot more. But the problems in football run deeper than the decisions made by those in charge of the sport.

 There was so much wrong with Greg Dyke’s speech about the future of English football this week. He claimed there is a need for radical action within football if the England national football team is to remain competitive. It was timed conveniently before a period, which will decide whether England under the management of Roy Hodgson will qualify for next summer’s World Cup in Brazil. If England fail to reach that target, there now is a ready made excuse. Hodgson is excused. The people who appointed him are excused. Self-preservation rules.

 Alarmingly, there was a lack of focus from Dyke on the primary reason why there are so few English footballers of genuine international class. Grassroots football is failing. It is just too expensive to play football. Participation figures suggest that football remains as popular as ever. It isn’t. There are fewer English players in the Premier League. But there are fewer kids playing football. Figures are misleading. Every amateur league demands that a player – be it a youth or an adult – signs forms at the start of every season. Most clubs will also charge signing-on fees, which, contribute towards the cost of the pitch, the cost of the kit, the cost of administration, the cost just to enter a league and the cost of facilities like changing rooms, which, reliably, are as inviting as a cell in a Turkish prison.

 The team I currently play for on a Sunday morning has more than 20 registered players. By the end of the season, that number will have fallen to 13 or 14 at most. Several will drop out, understandably fed up with shelving out petrol costs just to attend matches only to be selected as a substitute.

 The FA should find a way to subsidise costs – particularly at junior level. For the money involved in playing a full-season of amateur football you can buy a season ticket at Anfield or Old Trafford. That’s how expensive it is.

 The FA is awash with cash. It needs to play its part. But so does the government – those in charge of education. If you are good at football, you should be encouraged to play it – just like they are in other leading countries: Spain and Germany.

 Education is important. But football is an education. By being able to participate, a young person learns important transferable individual and team skills. Like in any other area of industry, a footballer won’t get very far without hard work.

 Maybe if the clock wasn’t allowed to drift onto 2.16, the landscape of football might not appear so desperate.

Shankly, Busby and David Peace...

It says much about Bill Shankly’s regard for the person as well as the job Sir Matt Busby did at Manchester United that when Liverpool directors first approached him asking whether he’d like to take charge of the ‘best club in the country’ he supposedly responded sharply: “Why, is Matt Busby packing up?”

 A year earlier his Huddersfield Town team had beaten Liverpool 5-0. He later recalled Liverpool’s directors leaving the ground “in single file with their shoulders slumped, like a funeral procession.” Undeterred, Shankly accepted the role at Anfield and would change the history of football. Fifteen seasons on Liverpool had emerged from the old Second Division to win three league titles, two FA Cups and the UEFA Cup. They had became the most consistently successful team in England. At the start of the same summer that Shankly retired, United were relegated – a mark of the shift in power.

 Shankly’s reign was not without its struggles, however. He fought with board members, people he believed were just there “to sign the cheques.” He accused Liverpool of lacking ambition. Players like Johnny Morrissey were sold behind his back. He offered to resign several times.

 Shankly was a talker. He’d relish telling other managers how good his team was with phone calls late into the night. He’d talk on and on, rarely affording an opportunity to interject. Only Liverpool mattered. But that was his passion.

 In the bad times, he’d talk then too. Busby was a confidant. More than once it is thought that Busby convinced Shankly not to walk away from Anfield. When the Liverpool board searched for Phil Taylor’s successor, they canvassed the opinions of eminent figures. They spoke with Geoff Twentyman, the Liverpool captain and a former player of Shankly’s at Carlisle United. They spoke with Walter Winterbottom, the England manager. Then there was Busby. Because Busby too had been a Liverpool captain, he understood the people of the city; he understood the Anfield crowd. He understood it was the right place for a person with Shankly’s character to thrive.

 This aspect of Shankly’s story is, perhaps, one of the most intriguing elements to David Peace’s outstanding novel Red or Dead. At 720 pages long, the book covers a 22-year period. It begins in the wintertime at Huddersfield with Liverpool chairman TV Williams and his accomplice Harry Latham walking towards Shankly at the old Leeds Road ground, carrying what they believed to be an interesting proposal. It ends with sobriety at Shankly’s death in 1981.

 The first half is especially tough to read. There is a visceral power rare in football-themed books, which are usually created for entertainment, distancing us from the true impact of the sacrifice that went before the glory. By using repetition Peace sustains the story. You begin to feel how Shankly must have felt – proud, drained but determined to do it all over again for the greater good.

 It is possible, though, that had it not been for Busby’s intervention at crucial times Liverpool would not have become the sporting institution it is now. Possibly Shankly would have gone elsewhere and achieved greatness. Red or Dead suggests Aston Villa approached him to be their manager. Perhaps Villa could have won all of those titles instead. Liverpool may have remained in the second tier of English football – it could have even got worse. Maybe.

 The relationship between Shankly and Busby was unique in the sense the pair were rarely photographed together. In his time Shankly must have been the most photographed person in the North West of England. Shankly was pictured with everybody – with players, with family, with friends, with unfamiliar adults hoping just to be near the man they believed was the greatest, and with children who just wanted an autograph. But there are few with Busby.

 The pair would meet in private, often inside offices at Old Trafford rather than Anfield. They sympathised with one another. Through the eyes of Busby, the book tells the story about a time when a director sitting behind him during a match asked the United manager why he wasn’t playing a certain player. Busby apprehended the director later on in the toilets and in the next board meeting placed an issue at the very top of the agenda. It read: no interference by directors.

 Shankly and Busby must have seen each other as comrades: Scottish men of mining stock, away from home trying their best to be the best they can. In Red or Dead the relationships between others of similar backgrounds are explored. There is Jock Stein, the Celtic manager, who Shankly always calls ‘John’. In the second half of the book Harold Wilson, the Labour Prime Minister, features heavily.

 Peace believes Shankly’s, Busby’s, Stein’s and Wilson’s upbringings helped them emerge as leaders. “It certainly shaped the way they viewed work and team,” he says. “Especially where Bill came from, you can’t go back and romanticise the conditions. There was harshness and poverty. But there was an idea there that everybody had to help each other out, rely on each other. Otherwise you weren’t going to succeed. The only way to move forward was to get everyone to pitch in. From that experience they were able to inspire other people. I don’t think Shankly saw himself as a leader. He just saw himself as the person that was trying to move the whole thing on.”

Shankly could relate to other managers. They had something in common – a union. If he fell out with any of them it did not last for long. Liverpool, Manchester United and Leeds United were regularly positioned towards the top of the league. Yet those in charge at each club would remain in regular contact.

 “Most Saturday nights, Bill would ring Don Revie and they’d talk about the games they’d had that afternoon,” says Peace. “Revie was really insecure and completely different from Shankly. One year Leeds had a bad start to the season and were really low down in the league. Revie was worried about relegation and he told Shankly about these concerns. Shankly told him that he had Billy Bremner – one of the greatest players in the world. ‘Of course you’ll be fine, Don!’ Bill put down the phone but five minutes later he calls him back. ‘Don – all that stuff I said about Billy Bremner was right – but don’t forget he’s not as good as Tommy Smith’.

 It is true that some managers in the modern game speak to each other regularly. Sir Alex Ferguson for instance had associations with David Moyes and Sam Allardyce. Peace believes it is very possible that Ferguson adopted the skill of developing alliances from Shankly and Busby. “Again, their backgrounds and histories are similar.”

 Ferguson has recalled behaving like a groupie on the evening he was welcomed to Anfield by Shankly. Shankly shook Ferguson by the hand and overwhelmed him with compliments before warning that his Aberdeen side had no chance against “our great team” in their forthcoming European Cup tie. Ferguson regarded the former Liverpool manager, along with Stein and Busby, as a deity, which made his suffering all the greater when, over the weeks that followed, Shankly’s prediction was proved right. Aberdeen were beaten 1-0 at Pittodrie before being taught a few awkward lessons on Merseyside, losing 4-0 to a team who, under Bob Paisley, were on course for a third European Cup in five seasons.

 “Had Busby not been there for Shankly, perhaps Liverpool mightn’t have grown,” Peace wonders. “But had Liverpool and Shankly not emerged, perhaps Ferguson wouldn’t have learned his lessons early in management too. I suppose you could say that’s ironic.”

Red or Dead is published by Faber and Faber is available from most book stores.

A few words with Joe Allen, September 2012

Dani Alves believes that Xavi, his Barcelona team-mate, does not need to run. Instead, he makes the run by ushering other players into the areas he desires. “Xavi,” Alves said, “plays in the future.”

 At one time, though, the future wasn’t predefined. Barcelona took a while taking to Xavi. Aged six, the midfielder certainly charmed but the then director of youth football Oriol Tort was not convinced by his physical capabilities.

 “He is very small, but you will sign him,” insisted Xavi's father, also known as Joaquim, a former Sabadell player in the first division. It took almost five years to convince Tort but in July 1991, aged 11, Xavi scored three goals in a trial and signed a youth contract.

 There he found a space and two decades on, he is still finding spaces, only on the pitch - having made more than 600 appearances for a club that is more than just a club. As Xavi said: “That's what I do. All day. I'm always looking.”

  At 5ft 7”, size hasn’t held Xavi back. An inch smaller, it won’t restrict Joe Allen, either.

 “It might have been an issue for other people but never for me,” Allen says from inside a Melwood anteroom on a Monday morning. “It was something I had to fight against. I wasn’t really bothered. I kept chasing the dream, believing in myself. You have to be single-minded. You could ask anyone in this [Liverpool] dressing room and I’m sure they’ll tell you that there were people that doubted them. That’s why they’re here now, I guess; because they had the mental strength to prove the doubters wrong. I think football is a game where there is a style of play or position for anyone.”

 Xavi’s ascension to the role of arguably the greatest midfielder of a generation has changed perceptions. Not so long ago, players like him – especially in England – were overlooked in favour of more powerful beasts when time came to promote from academy to first team. Now, though, those with technical qualities are catching up.

 “I think talent is essential in football,” Xavi said. “On a football pitch, it is the technique of a player that always makes the difference, not his physical power.

 “Physical fitness is an important part too, but anyone can work on it. Technique and talent on the contrary are innate. You either have them or not. If you don’t have the talent, you can’t play football. Barca and Spain dismantle that kind of thinking with talent; not only can we play well, but we often manage to win too.

 “Personally, I suffered a period in my career because of my small size. In 2002, 2003, it was said that I could not play in midfield because you had to be physically strong to play there. I proved that this theory does not hold water.

 “For me, Luis Aragones has been a pioneer in this field, an apostle of the beautiful game that has proven that, with technique, you can also achieve things. And talent is the key.”

 Like Aragones - Xavi’s former national team coach - Brendan Rodgers is a disciple of this theory. On becoming Liverpool manager, he outlined his vision for the future. “I like to be responsible for our own destiny,” he said. “If you are better than your opponent with the ball, you have a 79 per cent chance of winning the game. It is quite logical. It doesn’t matter how big or small you are.”

 Such beliefs helped propel Allen to where he is today; a Liverpool midfielder and international player of considerable value. Allen had already been given opportunities in Swansea’s first team by the time Rodgers was appointed as their manager in the summer of 2010. Since then, however, he blossomed under the guidance of someone that understood his attributes implicitly.

 “It takes the success of one player to break the stigma,” Allen says. “Thankfully in Barcelona, they have had a whole team of them. I’m lucky, in some ways I guess that my progression has coincided with that emergence. But I’m also fortunate that I’ve had the opportunity to work with a series of managers that have been willing to give me a chance. Football is all about opportunities.”

 Rodgers revealed that he would have spent a lot more money to bring Allen to Liverpool. The 22-year-old, Rodgers said, had a Welsh heart but the mind of a Spaniard in terms of his surgical football ability. Direct comparisons with Xavi, or indeed, his midfield sidekick Andres Iniesta, are too soon according to the player.

 “It’s easy to forget that Xavi is 32, 33. When I watch him, he seems to get better with every season,” Allen says. “It’s like he has no age. What Xavi does better than everyone else is his movement all over the pitch. In the tightest of situations, he finds a solution whether he’s helping out the defence, in the middle of the pitch or in attack. I know I’ve got a way to go before I can be that influential.”

 It’s almost as if Xavi plays with wing mirrors. “Before I receive the ball, I must systematically take a look at everything on the pitch, to know what I should do with it,” Xavi says. “I have to see where my teammates are to pass on the ball, make an orientated control or give the ball back to the defenders to save time.

 “In this context, Zidane was the undisputed master, because in addition to having an extraordinary vision of the game, he could use both of his feet. Every one of his actions was a spectacle. I, on the other hand, find it difficult playing with my left foot.

 “I didn’t learn all of this with the Barca first team. We were taught to think before we accept a pass, to protect the ball, and raise our heads to see where our teammates are. All these concepts are instilled in them while they are still young by continuously repeating these exercises.”

  Allen believes that midfielders have to play the game with “eyes attached to the back of the head,” otherwise possession will be surrendered. Essentially, it’s being streetwise and playing the game with a common sense; observing the efforts of everything around including both team-mates and opposition.

 “To me, football is a game of angles. You allow yourself some space, you offer for the ball, release it then reposition yourself in an area to receive it again. You’re constantly repeating yourself. Doing that consistently is the difficult part and you only get that through practice.”

 Unlike Xavi, Allen did not have the fortune of emerging from a fabled youth system like Barcelona’s academy at La Masia. Instead, Swansea scouts spotted him in his early teens playing for Tenby Boys’ after growing up in nearby Narbeth.

 Given Allen’s father, Steve, is a dentist and his mother, Jane, is a nurse, he could have pursued an alternative career. He speaks fluent Welsh and his articulation of the English language during this interview suggests that university might have beckoned. Yet both parents pushed him in the direction that inspired him most.

 “Football wasn’t just a pastime for me, it was a passion,” he says. “I was fortunate to have parents who supported my passion. Narbeth is a quiet town, a long way from the Premier League. But now I’m here. Obviously you have to be mentally tough to ride through some of the more difficult periods but when you have parents that back you all the way, it makes it easier to succeed. I know it sounds clichéd but being a footballer was all I could see myself wanting to do.”

 Allen was a part of the Swansea system from the age of nine. At 16, Kenny Jackett gave him his debut in the Welsh Cup to Port Talbot Town with Swansea eventually losing 2-1 after extra time. Later, he made his league debut under Roberto Martinez during a 6-3 defeat at home to Blackpool.  “Not the greatest of starts,” he remembers. There were further set-backs. A loan spell at Wrexham was curtailed when he damaged his ankle ligaments. “Frustrating.” Fortune finally came his way when upon his own return from injury, the influential Dutchman Ferrie Bodde was ruled out for the rest of the 2008-09 season. In the April, he scored his first goal professional goal during a 2-2 draw with fierce South Wales rivals, Cardiff.

 Allen played under three different managers in less than three years in the first team at the Liberty Stadium before Rodgers’s arrival. “I cannot thank Swansea enough for helping me progress. It is a great club for young players to learn the proper values of what makes football a special sport. They have an idea and stick to it.”

 Jackett, Martinez, Paulo Sousa and Rodgers followed a similar mantra. But it was Rodgers that took the club into the Premier League for the first time.

 “There was a feeling that he was going to be a special manager and take us forward,” Allen says, “He instilled a real sense of professionalism in the squad. Players saw how hard he worked; all the hours, and realised how hard they needed to work to match his ambitions. There was a genuine passion for football and that rubbed off on everybody. Especially when you are a young player, you’re keen to take everything in like a sponge. When you have someone guiding you like that, it helps a lot.”

 Allen became the player that the Swansea defence looked towards immediately after they received possession. Few his age have ever been given such a responsibility in their own individual as well as a team’s debut Premier League season.

 He flourished. Aside from the general impression made, Allen’s pass completion rate of 91 per cent was better than even Barcelona’s Iniesta. No Liverpool midfielder managed better than 86 per cent in the same period.

 When Rodgers agreed to become Liverpool manager in June, one of his immediate priorities was to recruit the diminutive conductor of play. Now, Allen senses history repeating itself.

 “Walking in here a few weeks ago, the sprit is the same,” he says. “The dressing room has responded to the manager’s methods. It will take a little while for the team to click properly because nothing is instant in football. The word ‘team’ is key because he [Rodgers] always emphasises that he wants individuals to perform but within the framework of the ‘team.’ It has been highlighted already how much he wants to play the right way in terms of passing the ball but just important is the team; pressing high collectively and win the ball back as quickly as possible. When you play like that as a team, it allows individuals to be at their best. That was the message at Swansea and it’s the same here.”

 Allen appreciates the pressure is different at Liverpool compared to Swansea. He insists, though, that a greater success can be achieved by virtue of following the same principles.

 “Brendan believes and I definitely believe that this is the best way to win matches. If there was another way to win matches, I’m sure the philosophy would change. We’re in a results business and we’re very aware of that.

 “The key is to stick to the approach and not waiver from it. There were flaws during certain games last season. But after adversity, we didn’t change.

 “In the long-term that has to be the way forward.”

This interview originally appeared in last month's Liverpool FC Magazine. To subscribe, vist: http://tinyurl.com/d929dh6

Andre Wisdom, speaking 12 months ago

Andre Wisdom was raised on the same street as Micah Richards in the tough Chapeltown area of Leeds. The physical comparison between the athletic Manchester City right back and Liverpool's reserve team captain is apparent the moment he turns to welcome LFC magazine at the club's academy in Kirkby; his torso stretching every fibre in his sweat sodden training shirt with all the elasticity of a cruiserweight champion.

  Wisdom only turned 18 in May. He is a teenager in a man's body. His mind is also advanced of his peers. That's why he is chosen to lead, sometimes rotating the captaincy with Conor Coady.

  By modern standards, though, Wisdom is a late developer. Despite intermittent periods at Leeds United, he was playing park football until the age of 14 when he was spotted by Bradford City. Within six months, a call came from Liverpool. 

 “Everything happened quite quickly for me,” he remembers, pointing out that it was evolution of Richards from street footballer to England international that partly inspired him. “Aaron Lennon came from round our way too...you realise that you can do it; make it in football. You also have to want it more than others.”

 Wisdom is mindful that he hasn't made it just yet, although his development over the last four years has been rapid. Aged 15, he lined up against an Arsenal side containing Jack Wilshere in the FA Youth Cup Final of 2009 when everyone else on the pitch was a minimum of two years older than him. A year later he was selected to captain the under-18s side and before long he was receiving international recognition, winning the European Championships at under-17 level with England. Soon, despite suffering a knee injury at the start of last season that would keep others out for much longer, he was in Liverpool's reserve team well before the end of the campaign with all of his key attributes still in tact, particularly acceleration. His recovery was marked last week when he was selected in Stuart Pearce's England under-21 squad to face Azerbaijan and Israel in September.

 There remains a final push to reach Liverpool's first team, however. And then he must remain there. Wisdom was selected by Kenny Dalglish to travel to the Far East this summer before featuring in three of the Reds' six pre-season friendlies, usually at right-back. His fortnightly schedule is currently split between Kirkby and Melwood; one week here, another week there. The decision is a deliberate one to give he and others the necessary experience in a first team environment if ever called upon, while also reminding them of the prize for consistent performances with the Reserves, under-18s or maybe even lower than that.

 Wisdom's physique is natural. But he admits it will only get him so far. A common pitfall in youth football is the over-reliance on players whose bodies have developed as a faster rate than their contemporaries. It can sometimes make them look special; before the rest catch up. To become an established player in the Premier League, especially as a defender, positioning and an appreciation of space is essential. 

 “When you're younger, you do a lot of things on instinct but as you get older you realise why people do the things they do,” he says with sapience beyond his years. “Being at Melwood, you see how people move. Sometimes you don't need pace as a defender because if you know how to position yourself, you can put yourself one step ahead of the attacker. As you get older, defenders mature and you realise it's not all about physicality. Being built the way I am, I understand that being physical will only help me so much. To be a complete defender, you need to understand how the game is played.”

 Wisdom talks slowly and deliberately, often pausing to consider each question. Dealing with the media is part of a footballer's job. When at Melwood, he listens to those around him – how those at the zenith of the game present themselves.

 “You take bits from everywhere,” he continues. “At the top there's Jamie Carragher. [During training] You watch his movement; the way he read the game and organises the team...then [off the pitch] you see way he talks to people and presents himself. It makes you think 'if I was in the same situation, I'd try and do that...say that.'”

 Like Carragher, Wisdom studies football. “Abroad you see defenders like Carles Puyol who is probably a similar build to me. I love his passion for the game...his aggression. I watch a lot of foreign stuff but I think you can learn from the lower leagues as well. There's a lot of players who have dropped down the league and sometimes into the Conference who you can learn from. Someone in my position needs experience and if you don't have that already you have to learn from others that do.”

 As captain of the reserves, Wisdom takes his responsibility seriously. After just a few minutes in his presence, you can tell that he's the type that others will follow.

 “I think that if you are a leader, you have to set the example by playing well...It's the small things that matter... You can't shout at someone if you aren't giving 100-per-cent yourself so you need to play approach every game like it's your last. You also have to realise that every player is different. I know some captains that might just treat everyone the same but there are some players that you get more from if you encourage them and others if you tell them off. It's about understanding the team and the characters around you. For me, you don't win games if you don't enjoy it so you need to find a way of making everybody look forward to games. If everyone wants to win and you try your best you can't ask for much more.”

 He speaks like a statesman but one with humility. Such grounding comes from his professional day: One afternoon he might be marking Luis Suarez in a training exercise but the next morning he could be back at the Academy playing table tennis with a member of the club's under-15s squad.

 “It's good being around the first team players but I love being down here too. It's like a family...everyone gets along. Being here keeps you on a level...you're desperate to make the next step, something I'm desperate to achieve.”

 How does he go about reaching this? The competition is fierce.

  “All I can do is give absolutely everything...try my hardest in every training session, every gym session and concentrate every time the manager speaks. Training with the first team is a big bonus too, testing yourself against the best players can only help you. You play against Andy Carroll who's a right handful then Luis Suarez who's different to that – very tricky. You learn different lessons. If I take these lessons with me and onto the pitch then maybe at some point I'll get an opportunity. You have to fight for it.”