Of Man Utd and Spurs

As a job, I audit management systems.

It sounds dull, and is, pretty much.

But the three main management systems sets of how organisations should be run, how strategic decisions are made, how to manage what the organisations does, and the people, information and so on.

So, when I turn my professional knowledge to the world of football, I see problems.

And problems that do not seem to be getting better.

I was listening to Radio 5 yesterday, sitting in a leisure centre car park, the reason for which will be part of the daily post, but I heard a guy who writes for the Manchester United fanzine, United We Stand, saying how the new manager at the club has a philosphy, and the club will have to adapt to that.

I hear reports of when a club is looking for a new manager, that a candidate "interviewed well", whatever that means.

But here is my point. Or points.

It is the club's job to decide on the philosophy that the team has, and employ a manager or coach who is best to execute that philosophy. The club should have the strategic vision and plans to recruit young and current players based on the philiosophy, or the style of play they would like the team to play, and so the replacement of managers or coaches shouldn't matter as much as it does.

Because if the club is waiting for, or expecting, the new coach to come in and change fortunes with the 30 or 40 player squad the old one has, by playing a different kind of football, then it aint gonna work, as the revemp of the squad to meet the new guy's requirements might take four or more transfer windows, by which time he is usually deemed to have failed, been fired, and another new coach is wanting a different set of players.

Multiply that six times over 12 years and you get a mongrel squad that really doesn't know what its actual philosophy is.

Ladies and gentlemen, I present to you the current Manchester United.

Spurs. Or Tottenham Hotspur have, or had a philisophy. Attacking, expansive, to dare is to doing kind of philisophy. They would leagues, coups, doubles with this. And then when Poch failed to win anything, the club appointed the Special one, Jose.

Jose was seen as a winner, buy plays dour, pragmatic football, the opposite of that Spurs have played for decades.

Spurs did not win, so then appointed Conte, a kind of Jose-lite coach, who continued the pragmatic football, did not win anyting and the fans became restless.

The now have Ange Postecoglou in charge. He's been there 18 months and is everything Jose and Conte wasn't, his philosophy is to play attacking football on stilts. And wen things are going wrong, double down and do it more.

Its exciting.

Spurs have not won anthing under Ange either, and in fact have lost 19 out of 40 games since the beginning of last season. Now there is talk of Ange needing to be sacked.

It all seems to unserious.

Not the sacking, the endless changing, expecting the next change to magically make everything right again.

And to keep doing the same thing over and over again and expect a different result each time is madness.

Adopting management system principles might not make Man Utd European champions or get Spurs to win anything again, but it might make the clubs think of the future and the clubs owners and chairpersons part in that, rather than sack a manager when things go slightly wrong.

No new manager can fix what is, or might be wrong at Man Utd and Spurs. To think they could is madness too. Fix the club, their decision making processes and strategic thinking and have actual plans and follow them through, might just work.

Until then, both will be like the clown in a circus, and for us who follow the game, the gifts that keep on giving.