Foreign Managers in Premier League
Top Clubs - Liverpool,Chelsea and Arsenal Employ Overseas Coaches
The growing number of foreign and non-English managers in the Premier League is restricting the opportunities for England-born managers to experience top level management
Foreign and overseas managers, including non-English born managers, have taken over the Premier League. Eleven clubs, including the top four, all come into this category and only five of these clubs have a British manager - Manchester United, Birmingham City and Everton have Scots, Sir Alex Ferguson, Alex McLeish and David Moyes respectively, while Blackburn Rovers have Welshman, Mark Hughes and Aston Villa have Martin O’Neill the former Northern Ireland international. Sunderland are managed by the former Republic of Ireland international Roy Keane.
The immense success achieved by Arsene Wenger at Arsenal has encouraged club Chairmen to look overseas in the hope that they can unearth the next ‘Arsene Wenger’ to bring trophies to their club. This has resulted in a reduction of the management opportunities for English-born managers in top flight football and especially with the top clubs.
Top Clubs' Success
The success of the top four clubs, Manchester United, Arsenal, Chelsea and Liverpool, during the Premiership years has been driven by non-English managers – Ferguson, Arsene Wenger (France), Claudio Ranieri (Italy), Jose Mourinho (Portugal), Gerard Houllier (France) and Rafa Benitez (Spain). With the Premier League being dominated by these four clubs and their monopoly of qualification for Champions League football, there are limited opportunities for English born managers to experience football management at the highest level in club football.
Arsene Wenger
Arsenal appointed Arsene Wenger in 1996 to replace Bruce Rioch and he has turned the club from a defensive minded team to a club that plays exciting flowing football. Previously, Arsenal’s success, especially under George Graham, was based on sound defence, with the club famous for one goal victories. Now teams have to resort to tough defensive tactics in an effort to stop them playing because they simply can not outplay the Arsenal team. Clubs like Bolton, Middlesbrough and Blackburn have achieved success against Arsenal by such tactics but as Everton discovered in a recent defeat, they couldn’t outplay the Gunners. Even without Thierry Henri, Arsenal play quick, skilful football and they look set to add to their trophies this year.
Chelsea
Chelsea appointed Ruud Gullit (Holland) to replace Glenn Hoddle when he left to manage England. Hoddle had formed a good base for success at Stamford Bridge but it was Gullit who took it forward with FA Cup success. His successor Gianluca Vialli (Italy) added to that with success in Cup and Europe. Claudio Ranieri and subsequently Jose Mourinho benefited from that and supported by Abramovich’s billions Chelsea signed international players who won two league titles. Avram Grant (Israel) stepped into the manager’s role on the departure of Mourinho earlier in the season.
Liverpool
Liverpool have also relied heavily on foreign managers. Gerard Houllier took over from Roy Evans in 1998 and on his departure after six years, Rafa Benitez took his place to add to the club’s European success although they still covet the Premier League title and Benitez will be judged on his success in that competition.
Tottenham Hotspur
A club striving for success who have tried both British and foreign managers is Tottenham Hotspur. Having failed previously with foreign managers in Ossie Ardiles (Argentina) and Christian Gross (Switzerland) they appointed their former player and former England coach, Glenn Hoddle. However, when this didn’t work out they appointed Martin Jol (Holland) who after taking the cub into Europe for two successive seasons, he was sacked and Juande Ramos (Spain) replaced him.
Manchester City
Manchester City had former player Stuart Pearce as their manager but replaced him last summer with the former England manager, Sven-Goran Eriksson (Sweden) whose vast experience of club football in Italy, Spain and Portugal is paying off for the club who are enjoying their best season for many years.
It is the increasing number of foreign managers in the Premier League which is creating a block to the progress of any young England-born manager. There simply isn’t the opportunity to test themselves in the top league and show that they too would be capable of being successful. No club is prepared to take the risk as the consequences of failure and dropping out of the Premier League is too great to even contemplate.
