It’s almost parody.
Steve Bruce is a decent manager, who has a track record of getting teams promoted and, two relegations aside, keeping them in the Premier League. Who knows, he may even make a good England manager if Sam Allardyce doesn’t get offered the position.
However, Bruce’s pitch for the job, in the form of an interview with Martin Samuel in The Daily Mail, really is a sight to behold.
The Hull City manager believes the next England manager, no matter what, should be English, gives out about the scourge of headphones, pampered players and wants England to to reclaim their identity.
There’s nothing concrete in his views, just abstract notions, nostalgia for a bygone time and the solutions offered don’t explain why England failed to beat a team coached by a dentist.
However, it makes for entertaining reading.
First up, Bruce complains about the lack of opportunities for English managers, despite the fact the next manager will be, almost certainly, English, and the last England manager was English. Whatever happens, the next man can’t be from “abroad”, that big place that isn’t England.
“If our players start to see coaching as a dead end, where is the next Ferguson, the next Clough or Shankly? It’s sad. How will players see a pathway, how are they going to see a future if even the England job goes abroad?”
Bruce also wants the country to reclaim their identity.
“We’ve got to get that English spirit back. It’s what we’re about, what we’re famous for… All we want to see is an England team playing with the energy we see in the Premier League every Saturday afternoon. Hunger, aggression — and without fear. We go to tournaments now and we’re wrapped up in fear. I see the players arrive, tracksuits, washbags, headphones, in their own world.”
Bruce’s plan to combat this fear? Get the players to wear suits on matchday, because the former Manchester United captain isn’t “a fan of tracksuits.”
“At Manchester United we would get off the coach, club blazer, Manchester United crest. We didn’t like the crest, then Fergie (Alex Ferguson) went out and made it even bigger. Yet players I played against have told me that when they saw us coming in, there was a little ‘wow’ factor. Here come Manchester United. We had identity.”
The job pitch, sorry, interview, reaches peak-levels of “proper football man” speak when giving out about the England players being protected from the rain by helpers. We stand to be corrected, but we’ve never seen England players being shadowed by minders with umbrellas, but, if Brucie becomes England boss, it will never happen.
“Call me old fashioned, but we’re now holding umbrellas up as our players get off a plane. Do they need that? It’s a few spots of rain. OK, they might get wet. Well, let them get wet. That’s what happens when it rains. We’ve got to find our humility again because, frankly — we ain’t that great. We haven’t got anywhere near winning, yet we’ve got very good players. So something is missing.”
Yes, something is missing all right Brucie. Never mind the problems of playing footballers out of position, of being tactically redundant or a series of individual errors, which appeared to be the issues when England lost to Iceland, a team in the truest sense of the world, the real issue with English football is that players can’t hold their own umbrellas.
Richard Keys agrees with Bruce’s “pure common sense” and has backed Big Sam to “get our game back”, the way England got their country back after Brexit.
Brucey's piece in The Mail today is a great read – pure common sense. Got a feeling Big Sam gets the top job and we get our game back.
— Richard Keys (@richardajkeys) July 13, 2016
Although, he doesn’t specify who exactly has stolen it. The comedy act that is the English national team looks on course for another appearance at the World Cup in two years.
