Whom the Gods wish to destroy they first call promising. Nobody sums up this aphorism in the peculiar context of English football better than Steve McClaren.
His early career checked all the boxes necessary to be filed under 'promising'. Relatively average playing career instilling an ambition to succeed as a coach? Check. Getting the opportunity to hone your coaching craft by working with one of the finest managers in the game? Check. Moving into management with a lower club, establishing Premier League credentials, buttressed with an unlikely run in Europe? Check. Be mentioned as a future England manager? Check.
The bestowing of the England job led to McClaren's destruction. Failure to qualify for Euro 2008, along with the glum wielding of an umbrella led to the 'Wally With A Brolly' headlines that forced McClaren to resurrect his career abroad.
McClaren did quite well abroad, winning the Dutch title with FC Twente. But McClaren is a true Englishman - as he showed when abroad by speaking English with a Dutch accent instead of learning to speak Dutch - so he was bound to come back to England eventually. Failure to get Derby County promoted resulted in him being given the Newcastle job, and sadly, now that he is back in the spotlight of theEnglish media, he is floundering once more.
Newcastle, despite spending more money than anybody else in the Western World in January, are 19th in the League and in a dogfight to avoid relegation. The pressure is beginning to get to McClaren, judging by this report in today's Guardian.
The paper reports that McClaren had to be separated from a journalist formerly employed by Newcastle. McClaren accused the journalist of writing mistruths and pursuing a negative agenda against the club. The journalist in question has reported that the players at the club are surprised that McClaren hasn't been sacked yet.
During his press conference, McClaren uttered a couple of pointed comments towards said journalist:
Someone told me about it, and unfortunately it’s been done, obviously, by a journalist who for the last 18 months has written nothing but negative things about Newcastle, a journalist who used to work at this football club and who four or five years ago was released from this club.
Whatever that journalist writes I’m afraid I don’t read it. That article is half-truths and half-lies. It destabilises everything we are trying to do in the dressing room. We have to ignore it.
At the briefing's conclusion, the journalist followed McClaren out the door and a heated exchange ensued, with the writer defending his stories and saying the following:
Don’t you dare accuse me of having an agenda.
You are second bottom of the league. Is this your latest excuse? You’re the problem not me. Walk away Steve, smile, grin. He has been out of his depth since the moment he walked in.
The report claims that the pair relocated to a quiet corner and relations thawed.
It is not encouraging for McClaren however, and failure to beat Bournemouth today will see the pressure intensify to almost unbearable levels. Poor McClaren, he is increasingly emblematic of a beleaguered, middle-aged car salesman struggling to hit his targets amid competition from his youthful, handsome and charming colleagues.
