AGE AIN’T NOTHING BUT A NUMBER
Shrimp creole washed down with a firefly gimlet of vodka, lime juice, kleos mastiha and mint on the rocks, followed by red-velvet cake will set you back north of $50 in Dizzy’s Club at the Lincoln Center, Manhattan. All good if you’ve a new job starting the next day, especially one that carries a healthy bonus. Only problem being your presence is requested in Huddersfield’s unhappy valley the very next afternoon. Being Neil Warnock, such an assignment presented no problem and neither was it a new job, since English football is running out of provincial outposts he hasn’t previously managed. On Thursday night, courtesy of Danny Ward’s goal, Huddersfield beat Sheffield United 1-0 to make sure at least one bunch of Royals, those associated with Reading FC, have an unhappy coronation weekend: the Terriers are staying up.
Since 16 February, when Warnock proclaimed “you’d have to be a bloody idiot to come here”, the Terriers – particularly once they hit mid-March – have chewed up the rest of the Championship relegation contenders. “I’m just chuffed to death really,” cheered Warnock on Friday, though at 74, he has no plans to stay in West Yorkshire. The farm in Cornwall, a summer theatre tour of football b@nter past and old, the ISDN connection in the cowshed that helps along his various broadcast assignments and, last but not least, his wife Sharon take precedence. But Warnock is not done with football. He just has a different career path in mind. “I can’t do 10 months of this, I’ll be back somewhere in February I’m sure,” he chirruped.
Huddersfield’s resurrection was a retread of the rescue job he performed at Rotherham in 2016, when a mere 68. That stint in South Yorkshire may soon be regarded as a pioneering experiment, with the experienced likes of Warnock – man-managers, motivators, troubleshooters – providing the vibe shift an ailing club needs. The Premier League’s already on board with the idea. Having taken in winter sun, rowing weekends with Ray Lewington and crate-digging for first editions at literary festivals, Roy Hodgson was only too delighted to return to Crystal Palace at 75, and lately has Selhurst swinging to a $exy samba football nobody who watched Neuchâtel Xamax in the early 1990s thought possible.
And only just up the road from Huddersfield, enter Sam Allardyce, fresh from Dubai’s sun-loungers and humidors, champagne cocktails with his wife Lynne and Reidy, Keysey and Gray-y, a mere pup at 68. Keen to throw back the idea he’s old and antiquated, he raised his pint of Prime to two contemporaries adding a new, spring-cleaning dimension to the management game. “I am hoping it is going to be a trio,” roared Allardyce, detailed with keeping Leeds up and facing Manchester City on Saturday as the post-coronation celebrations begin. “There’s Roy, Neil and me … It would be good for the oldies, wouldn’t it?”
QUOTE OF THE DAY
“The club’s position is my position. That is clear. Besides that, this is definitely a subject which I cannot really have a proper opinion about … I am pretty sure a lot of people in this country will enjoy the coronation. Some will not be interested and some will not like it. That is it and that is over the whole country” – Jürgen Klopp doesn’t let his hamstring-twang affect his swerve from the news that Liverpool will play the national anthem before Saturday’s home game with Brentford, despite expected opposition from home fans.
FOOTBALL DAILY LETTERS
“Am I the only soul who finds it odd that there is a plethora of rules, regulations and customs that prevent star players being boosted into teams at the back-end of a season, whether to add that extra 10% to win a trophy, or as grit to avoid a drop. I mean, it’s not on, is it? So how come there’s no rule about managers? I know it isn’t working out for Frank Lampard, and may not for Sam Allardyce, but surely this is a goose/gander situation” – Russell Richardson.
“It is worth noting that when the fans of PSG demonstrate outside the club, protest outside Neymar’s house, say ‘we can’t stand it anymore’, complain about players ‘without sporting ambition’, they are talking about a club that has won Ligue 1 nine times since 2013, having only won it twice in its entire history before that, and is top of Ligue 1 by five points with only five games to go, so they will probably win the title again this season too. First-world problems and all that” – Noble Francis.
“After his visit to the Arabian Horse Museum (yesterday’s Football Daily), I hope you are not insinuating that Lionel Messi is being put out to stud by his current owners?” – Nigel Sanders.
“José Mourinho wearing a wire on the touchline with Roma (yesterday’s full email edition) sounds like a new TV crime spin-off … Football Law & Order: The Special One Victim Unit” – Peter Oh.
Send your letters to the.boss@theguardian.com. Today’s winner of our prizeless letter o’ the day is … Russell Richardson.
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