1 month ago
12 In his exclusive column for CaughtOffside, former Aston Villa attacker Stan Collymore discusses some of football’s biggest talking points, including why Thomas Tuchel is the wrong appointment for England, why Amanda Staveley is a leech on the game of football and why he doesn’t care about the Ballon d’Or awards.
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Tuchel’s appointment is a damning indictment on English football
Stan Collymore isn’t enthused by Thomas Tuchel’s appointment. Photo by Ryan Pierse/Getty Images, George Wood/Getty Images and Julian Finney/Getty ImagesI think that Thomas Tuchel’s appointment by the FA is a damning indictment on the notion of building St George’s Park and Wembley to be able to create a pathway for English coaches.
That’s dead in the water, because apart from Lee Carsley, you might throw in one or two minor names that have come through the system but there’s not a de la Fuente, for example.
We’re as far away as ever and we need to hold the FA to account as the guardian of the English game. They’re supposed to be pumping money into the game so that coaches are able to achieve a better and higher standard of coaching.
Gareth Southgate was an FA man but didn’t really come through that St. George’s Park system and the likes of Eddie Howe, Graham Potter, Frank Lampard and Steven Gerrard weren’t invited into the FA system when they finished playing.
Graham Potter had to go to Sweden, Eddie Howe was obviously at Bournemouth and Burnley, Gerrard was at Rangers, Lampard at Derby and Wayne Rooney over in MLS.
The FA has to make a more persuasive argument to get top quality players into the system on a more regular basis, and it’s clear where another of the problems lay too.
There is no incentive for them to do so at the moment. I had a look earlier this week, and the cost to undertake the FA Pro Licence is £13,700 – and that’s if you can get on a course.
About two or three years ago, it was just €1,800 to do the equivalent of the Pro Licence course in Spain, and they’ve got 2,200 coaches that have qualified. By comparison, England has 200.
So if you’re a guy that is a good amateur coach, a national league, League One or League Two player that’s coming to the end of your career, with the greatest respect to anybody, £13,700 is a lot of money to find.
If you’re having to pay 10 times as much in England than abroad to become a coach, then you’re going to have 10 times less in terms of coaching numbers.
That means the odds of the FA finding a Pep Guardiola or an Unai Emory in house are 10 times less. Simple maths.
That’s one problem. The second one is why are there so few places on courses?
There’s no clear, consistent, cost, effective pathway for English coaches, and it now goes to show, along with the Pep Guardiola rumours, that the pleading poverty and ‘we don’t want to buy out contracts’ stuff is a load of rubbish.
The FA have got more money than sense. The last instalment for Wembley was paid off in June, so we might now see a situation whereby Mark Bullingham could follow Thomas Tuchel if the German isn’t successful.
The simple reason why Thomas Tuchel shouldn’t be allowed to manage England
Stan Collymore isn’t a fan of Thomas Tuchel’s hire. (Photo by Ryan Pierse/Getty Images)International Football is about people from one nation versus people from another.
However, there’s been a genuine ‘clubification’ of international football over the past few years. Everything from players swapping allegiance (higher profile, bigger contracts playing for the glamour nation if they’re dual nationality), to high profile coaches effectively using international football as a nice part-time job before the next one of half a dozen plum jobs comes up.
It’s turning the purest form of the sport a farce.
A simple remedy is you declare, aged 18 and on signing a pro contract as a pro player or in completion of your pro licence as a coach, which country you wish to play for. Which country that you’re eligible to play for or coach.
The joke of players picking one country after representing another then ends, and countries via UEFA and FIFA can concentrate resources on making sure EVERY football nation knows who they can pick but more importantly know who to invest money in on their coaching pathway.
That would mean Tuchel can only manage Germany and Declan Rice, Jack Grealish etc would have had to make a choice aged 18 and back themselves as adults to make and stick to that choice.
I take a flag and travel almost everywhere to support and opine about England, and I can assure you that this England fan will give Tuchel the same support and excitement as Bobby Robson or Gareth Southgate got.
So this isn’t about him or anyone else being from outside England.
But at some point, international football has to be the people, culture, style and substance of that nation versus the same qualities of another. Otherwise it ceases to be international football, which then begs the question where does it end?
FIFA pressured to change rules to allow a new Messi to give up playing for Argentina and playing for the USA because it’s a ‘bigger market’?
Trust me, if the FA could have done that legally over the last 58 years of hurt, you know full well Cantona, Salah, Bergkamp, Henry and others would have been sounded out to play for ‘the country that pays them.’
Tuchel will get the warmest welcome from me and I’m sure 99% of England fans, but if you cherish international football then we need to go back to it’s fundamental reason of existing.
A team of people from one country versus a team of people from another. That means the kit man, the physio, player, Dr, everything.
Otherwise we may as well call it something novel… club football.
Vinicius’ Ballon d’Or win will be worthless
Stan Collymore doesn’t care about Vini Jr. winning the Ballon d’Or. Photo by Pascal Le Segretain/Getty Images.I think that the high water mark for the Ballon d’Or was during the Messi and Ronaldo era, quite simply because they were two exceptional players putting out exceptional numbers week in and week out.
To be perfectly honest, I don’t care about the Ballon d’Or at all. If it didn’t exist, there’s still the PFA Player of the Year, the PFA Young Player of the Year, Player of the Tournament in the Champions League, La Liga’s best player etc etc.
The awards are just an opportunity for a junket. A full gala dinner for the great and the good to get together, some glad handing, some networking, and an opportunity for FIFA to get ahead in a day and age where the Premier League, La Liga and UEFA generally tend to rule the football roost.
It doesn’t mean that you shouldn’t have something that acknowledges the best and I get why it exists, but let’s be perfectly honest the Ballon d’Or is more for the eight to 21 year old demographic. People beyond that just don’t really care about it.
They know what they see when they go and see their club. They know what they see when they stick on the television, in terms of the the people this year that are in the running for it. I mean, Harry Kane out scoring everybody in Germany should be in there.
I think that Vinicius Junior being given the award this year – if the rumours are confirmed – is so subjective. It’s still likely to be affected by friends in the game and tactical voting, whereas it should be a strict merit-based system, based on criteria that is known.
Or it just needs to be retired full stop.
Amanda Staveley’s potential investment in Tottenham proves she’s a leech
Amanda Staveley could take a position at Tottenham. Photo by Ian MacNicol/Getty ImagesI think Amanda Staveley is a new type of leech on the game of football, really I do.
She’s obviously very clever because she’s somebody that hasn’t got billions but is extraordinarily well connected to people that use their money to buy big assets, and rumours of an investment in Tottenham would provide her with a very quick and very effective way of making a huge return.
I get why Spurs would be seen as a a potential hostile takeover with Middle East businessman first buying a small amount of shares, then gradually buying the whole club. The suggestion from recent news reports were that it was 12.5 percent for £700 million, and then the Qataris would chew off the percentages until they bought the lot.
It makes absolute sense to buy Tottenham too. They’re in London and they’ve got a fantastic stadium which is arguably the best in the country if not the world. They’’re a known and historic name, and are massively underperforming in terms of what people could legitimately expect from them on the pitch.

 
The tradition of London also means something to the Sheikhs. The Shard and other landmarks in the capital were funded by Qatari money for example, and these things have massive clout in the Middle East. To be able to buy big, iconic British brands are seen as a solid and sound investment.
All of the 13 or 14 London clubs within the M25 should be rubbing their hands together though, because there’ll be a queue of sheikhs as long as your arm that will be wanting to invest in London landmarks and sporting entities, as these will become big levers of power for them.
Joe Lewis and Daniel Levy could be offered something ridiculous like £6bn to get out, and then Amanda Staveley, by putting in relatively little of her own money, will walk away with an astounding amount.
