Football thread - British managers...

Why is it that more and more managers in the Premier League are foreign?

Some have come in with a pedigree (Scolari, Benitez) but like Zola appointed today, he's got no experience as a manager. Why didnt they opt for an English equivalent, someone who has his FA badges but doesnt necessarily have the experience? Why not appoint from the league below, proven managers who have done good jobs on limited funds?

I have a number of gripes with the state of the English game at this point in time (being a Newcastle fan) but this is just my latest. It saddens me to think that we'll probably be going foreign now that Kev has gone. The likes of Deschamps who appears nothing better than average on record, and Fatih Terim who has a pedigree in Turkey where its as much of a 2 horse race as it is in Scotland.

I think that clubs seem to appoint foreign managers regardless of experience sometimes, because of the reputation they bring as a player. Now if some of Englands top players became coaches then they could draw from that talent pool, however as the number of top English players gets smaller and smaller each year, the pool is also going to get shallower until we'll have no British managers at all in the Premiership

Sad times indeed, and no doubt only going to get worse.

I think if you count up all the English managers who have ever won the Premiership then that's your answer.

Unfortunately it's a vicious circle and as you say, only going to get worse.

Premier league has only been won by 4 managers, 2 Scottish, one Portugese and one French.

I dont think you could base it on that though, as its too much of a closed shop at the top. If the top 4 arent going to appoint British managers (Ferguson aside) then a British manager will never win it as they have the funds due to repeated CL entry every year.

[Supervox]

I think it may have something to do with the fact that a lot of clubs these days like the idea of a coach as opposed to a manager - let the money boys decide on the players and let the coach take care of the training, tactics etc. The continentals have been using this approach for some time - we're heading that way now.

The foreign managers have brought a new mentality to the game on the whole. Footballers are highly paid athletes and not morally bankrupt drunkards who deem it ok to occasionally kick a ball around.

These managers have brought greater tactical awareness, diet programmes individual and team training sessions....and training in the morning and afternoon. So preventing afternoon boozing and blowing of cash with bookies.

If you ever want the English game to ever be considered great again, you should embrace what the foreigners bring and maybe the next generation of English players will place England back where they might be.

A great damage to the English game was created by the european ban following the Heysel situation. Many players never had a taste of european competition and so had no experience to draw on when moving in to management.